September 2, 2026
September 2, 2026
Dear Members of the W&L Community,
Welcome back to campus.
As our new students, faculty and staff begin to forge new friendships and become accustomed to new academic routines, I hope those of you returning are feeling refreshed after the summer and looking forward to the work of the academic year ahead. For me, after a few months of renewing my acquaintance with the role of president and the people who make what we do here possible, this is a time to reflect on what has changed since I was last on campus, what has endured, and our shared priorities for the year ahead.
For many of you, I am one of hundreds of new faces on campus. This fall, we are welcoming 490 new first-year undergraduates, 7 transfer students, and 130 law students to Lexington, along with 42 new faculty and 31 new staff members. The influx of new students, faculty, and staff each year is part of what makes a university such a vibrant and engaging place to work. The talents, interests, and perspectives they bring to our community complement the knowledge, familiarity, and commitment of those returning as we advance our shared mission.
As I look to the year ahead, I am excited by many of the projects and initiatives underway:
On the academic front, our faculty and staff wrapped up our Fall Academy, with two weeks of workshops and trainings designed to enhance the academic experience for our students. Ian Bogust’s academy keynote was the first in a series of events from our Liberating Ideas initiative and explored the impact of artificial intelligence on higher education — two themes we will revisit throughout the year.
Liberating Ideas programs, which focus on intellectual pluralism and civil discourse, will continue with a campus-wide survey on civic fluency; a series of campus speakers, debates, and student colloquia; and a new Freely Speaking program, led by student fellows who will learn to facilitate thoughtful dialogue among people with different perspectives through our membership in Davidson College’s Deliberative Citizenship Network. I hope that each of you will seek out opportunities to participate in these discussions.
AI will also remain a focus across campus, and I am pleased to announce that our longtime colleague David Saacke will spearhead these efforts in his new role as Executive Director of Institutional AI. David will work closely with our senior leadership team, our PLAI Advisory Board, and staff in both the Harte Center for Teaching and Learning and Information Technology Services to introduce new enterprise AI tools, guidelines, training programs, and communities of practice across academic and administrative departments.
Our new Cultivating Character program, which recently received a grant from the Program for Leadership and Character at Wake Forest University, will integrate character education topics and discussion into FYE 100, our first-year experience course, and help students form a concrete understanding of what it means to be trustworthy, responsible, and respectful members of the W&L community. It will also include a retreat for student leaders and professional development for our Student Affairs staff.
The year ahead will also be the final year of our capital campaign, which has already made a tremendous impact on campus. This summer I had the opportunity to tour both the Lindley Center for Student Wellness and Childress Hall, the new academic building for the Williams School of Commerce, Economics, and Politics. Both facilities have dramatically improved the student experience, thanks to the generosity of W&L alumni, parents, and friends. University Chapel reopened in June following an extensive renovation that modernized its infrastructure and updated its gallery spaces. The work underway beside Huntley Hall for phase two of the campus utility infrastructure project is impossible to miss, as is the dramatic progress on Founders Hall — the new building for Admissions, Financial Aid, and the Johnson Program. With Evans Hall offline for the next two academic years, we will all be spending a lot of time in the new pavilion on Cannan Green, which opens at the end of this month.
Not as visible, but no less important, is the progress we have made on access and affordability for our students. The Leading Lives of Consequence campaign has raised significant funds that have enabled W&L to become need-blind in undergraduate admissions, significantly expand law school scholarships, and grow the endowment for student opportunities like internships, research, and study abroad. We recently announced the expansion of the W&L Promise, which currently provides free tuition to undergraduate families with typical assets and income under $150,000. Beginning in Fall 2027, the Promise income threshold will increase to $200,000 for all families with students enrolled at W&L.
There’s a lot to look forward to in the year ahead, and it is my privilege to be back on campus to share it with you while the search continues for W&L’s next president. But before we dive fully into the bustle of the academic year, I invite you to stop and reflect with me on what our work is truly about, and to ask not what we will do this year, but why we do it. I will explore that topic in my Convocation address this evening on the front lawn.
I hope to see you there.
Ken