Assembly LIX: The Tercentennial of Yale University
Thursday, October 4  through Friday, October 5, 2001
Grad/Pro Sample Report
By Amy Bevilacqua '97 SOM
SOM Delegate

It was a weekend to be reminded of the power of SOM's connection to the greater Yale community. It was an untypical AYA assembly to be sure--one tied to the concluding weekend of the school's yearlong celebration of Yale's Tercentennial.

The first day of the weekend, Thursday, was devoted to AYA assembly business, presentations and breakouts--a day to look both backward and forward. Presentations from Maureen Doran '71 MSN, Chair of the AYA Board of Governors; Jeff Brenzel '75, AYA Executive Director; and Linda Koch Lorimer '77 JD, Vice President and Secretary of the University, offered a historical perspective on alumni relations and posed questions on how the school might better might connect to its alumni and facilitate alumni connecting to each other.

• Yale Clubs and Associations - What is the most important objective for Yale Clubs? How can Yale Clubs attract a greater diversity of alumni (school affiliations, age, gender, ethnicity)?
• Education and Assembly Programs - What educational opportunities should Yale be providing for alumni? What should AYA Assemblies be seeking to accomplish in the next three to five years?
• Graduate and Professional Schools - What would most attract G&P alumni to engage with Yale? How should Yale and the AYA communicate with G&P alumni?
• Yale College Classes - What should Classes seek to accomplish with Yale College Reunions? Aside from reunions, how could Classes act most effectively to promote class identity and networking?
• Identity and Personal Interest Alumni Groups - What support and services do groups organized around a particular interest need from AYA or Yale? Should groups organized around particular life interests (as distinct from classes, clubs, and schools) be represented in the AYA governance structure?

On Thursday evening, we attended a dinner and reception where we learned about an exciting new distance learning endeavor led by Herb Allison '65, former president and COO of Merrill Lynch who also sits on the Advisory Board of the International Center for Finance at SOM. The Alliance for Lifelong Learning is a nonprofit joint venture of Yale, Oxford, Princeton and Stanford (Harvard was originally also part of the mix, and will likely rejoin later on.) The Alliance offers online courses from faculty at all four institutions and is currently in the middle of a pilot launch, during which time alums from all four universities can take courses free of charge. As I heard Mr. Allison describe the Alliance and what it seeks to undertake, I got viscerally excited and signed up for a class right away when I returned home. I am currently taking a course on Roman women entitled, "eClaudia" from Yale Professor Diana Kleiner and am loving the combination of art history, classics, history and archaeology.

Although the Alliance will not be granting academic credits or degrees, the courses are of the highest quality and delivered by the faculty themselves. This is a critical way in which Yale, a key founder of the Alliance, hopes to strengthen lifelong relationships with alumni and enable them to update their education. The Alliance is due to officially launch in the spring of 2002 and will then be charging approximately $300 per course. I heartily recommend the courses to anyone, and if you want to check out the entire course catalogue, with offerings ranging from animal behavior to history to immunology, then go to www.allianceforlifelonglearning.org.

Overall, I was highly impressed by the professionalism of the AYA assembly and am looking forward to becoming involved in the organization. Enhancing the relationship of SOM alumni with the greater Yale community is my top priority in my role as a new AYA representative. We have a great opportunity coming soon, as the AYA assembly in the fall of 2002 will be on the topic of entrepreneurship and SOM will be working in concert with the AYA to develop programs and panel discussions exploring the topic of entrepreneurship. The next assembly, as there are two held each year, will be in April of 2002 and focus on the subject of Freedom of Speech and Expression at Yale.

As the bulk of this unusual weekend was taken up by the Tercentennial celebration, I wanted to pass on three highlights:

First, as part of the symposium on "Democratic Vistas, Global Perspectives," new SOM faculty member Florencio Lopez-de-Silanes co-presented a seminar on corporate governance with Dean Garten on "Short and Long-term Challenges to Business in the Global Economy." The seminar was well attended and so well presented that I admit, at the risk of seeming overly sentimental, it made me proud to be an SOM alum.

Second, the evening celebration out at the Yale Bowl was stunning. There was a mini world's fair set up outside the stadium with educational booths, roving entertainment and demonstrations of native dance. And inside, the Yale Bowl had been completely transformed into what looked like, and later became, a setting for a rock concert. With more than incidental assistance from the Yale Drama School and its alums, a wonderful show was conceived and performed. Narrators guiding us through a whirlwind history of the University included Sam Waterston, William F. Buckley, and Big Bird. Other illustrious alums such as Tom Wolfe '57 Ph.D. (the author), Tiffany Jackson '95 Mus.M. (the celebrated opera singer) and Calvin Hill '69 B.A. (the legendary Dallas Cowboy) performed or had a speaking part. And then Paul Simon came out and sang two songs, which brought the already rapt crowd to their edges of their seats, bobbing their chins and swaying to "You can call me Al."

And finally, the weekend came to conclusion with an address by Former President Bill Clinton, '73 LAW. Amidst a small army of black suited Secret Service mumbling into their lapels, President Clinton came to the dais and addressed the crowd of 8,000 students, faculty and alumni. Catcalls and shouts of "Four more years!" by students were met with raised eyebrows by some of the older audience members. This speech, the first time President Clinton had given a large public address since the September 11 attacks, offered some surprisingly personal reflections on the challenges now facing our country and our global neighbors, and reflected on the state of the world. An excerpt:

"If I had asked you on September the tenth, the following question, what would your answer be? What is the dominant trait of the world in the early twenty-first century? If you are an optimistic person, it seems to me you might have given one of four answers. You might have said, "Well, it's the globalization of the economy and culture that has lifted more people out of poverty in the last twenty years than any time in all history and brought America unparalleled wealth and opportunities, including the opportunity for first immigrants from all over the world."

Or you might have said, if you are a "techie," "It is the information technology revolution."…Or you might have said, if you were a scientist, "It's the evolution in the sciences."…We have scientists working on digital chips to replicate the nerve functions of damaged nerves in the spinal cord, and raising the prospect that what a chip might do for a spine is like what a pacemaker might do for the heart. Or if you are a political scientist, you might say the dominant trait of this period is the explosion of democracy around the world and diversity at home…Just for the last three years, for the first time in human history, more than half the world lives under governments of their own choosing.

On the other hand, if you are a little more pessimistic…you might have mentioned four negative things. You might have said all those positive things are just fine, but the environmental crisis facing us is so great that they all threaten to engulf all the progress and let it go away…Or you could say, "No, no, before that happens, we will be engulfed by health crises, the breakdown of health systems all over the world."…Or you could say, "No, the real problem is the flip side of globalization." Half the world's people aren't a part of it…Or even on September tenth, you might have said, "No, the biggest problem is going to be terrorism, coupled with weapons of mass destruction and rooted in racial and religious and ethnic hatred."

And here is what I would like to say: Whether you would have given a positive answer, or a negative answer, there is something that all eight of these elements, positive and negative, have in common. They all reflect the astonishing increase in global interdependence, the extent of which we have seen the collapse of distances and barriers, bringing us closer together for good or ill. Terrorism is simply the dark side of our increasing interdependence…That's why Yale's mission in its fourth century ­ to build a truly global university ­ is so important."

New Haven seemed more lively and bright than ever, the school shone with good repair and well manicured lawns, students seemed optimistic and energetic, and faculty offered thoughtful analyses of Yale's history and future prospects. It was an inspirational weekend. It was a weekend to be reminded of the power of Yale's connection to the larger world around us.