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10/09/2026 | News release | Distributed by Public on 10/09/2026 16:52

President Melissa Gilliam Delivers Annual Address: “Let’s Seize” This Moment

President Melissa Gilliam Delivers Annual Address: "Let's Seize" This Moment

In her address at Tsai Performance Center, President Melissa Gilliam said the students, faculty, staff, alumni, parents, and University stakeholders she's spoken to "love this institution, but they also need more from us. Because the world is now asking more of them."

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President Melissa Gilliam Delivers Annual Address: "Let's Seize" This Moment

Updates BU community on progress toward strategic framework goals

October 9, 2026
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In her second annual address on October 8, President Melissa Gilliam described Boston University's progress in the last year on the four pillars of its strategic framework. Her update-before hundreds of BU community members and peer academics in the Tsai Performance Center and watching live online-followed the bold vision she outlined in her first address.

The four pillars are: continuing BU's global reputation for intellectual and academic excellence; supporting BU's "world-class community of talent"; expanding global and local collaborations with organizations, governments, business, alumni, and other stakeholders; and modernizing the University's operation practices and facilities.

"The last time I was on this stage, I laid out our 'North Star' vision [as] the global destination of discovery, education, and human connection," Gilliam said. "Today, we're going to explore that road map."

How BU Turns Ideas Into Action

Gilliam detailed a changing world that requires thoughtful but immediate action on the pillars so that BU's impact evolves. She cited her many conversations with students, faculty, staff, alumni, parents, and University stakeholders.

Our Vision

Boston University will be the global destination of discovery, education, and human connection-a place of convergence where disciplines, communities, and realities merge and visionary thinkers unite to create transformative experiences and solutions for the world's greatest challenges.

Learn More About BU's Strategic Framework

"They love this institution, but they also need more from us," she said. "Because the world is now asking more of them. And they need us to get there, fast. To me, this is what is most pressing about the moment we face together, today. We must evolve and grow our impact in a changing world and do so in ways that matter to our communities."

The president posed a series of questions that BU must answer to meet this imminent challenge: "How do we ensure our graduates succeed? How do we create a Boston University environment in which all people can thrive? How do we face this technological future and remember what it is to be human? How do we increase our impact in Boston and around the world? How do we take steps now that serve generations to come?"

Occasionally strolling the stage during her talk, Gilliam mixed gravitas with a conversational, intimate tone. Behind her, a wall screen, tinged with soft red light, flashed crisp campus photos, at one point breaking into a split screen with dozens of faces of BU community members.

Short videos, reporting on the progress made on each pillar, punctuated Gilliam's remarks. Other videos showcased students, explaining why they chose to attend the University, what it's taught them, and how it might be even better. The audience also heard brief remarks from three BU leaders: University archivist Sean Noel (CAS'94, MET'02); Muhammad Zaman, College of Engineering HHMI Professor of Biomedical Engineering and Global Health and director of BU's Center on Forced Displacement (CFD), and Manuel Cuevas-Trisán, senior vice president for people, belonging, and culture. Violinist Leqing Wang (CFA'27) provided a musical interlude.

Watch a video of the event below.

A Large University That Stresses Human Connections

A theme of the event was human connection, on campus and beyond. Gilliam emphasized that, while "universities are engines of discovery, perhaps even more important, especially during this unique moment in history, is a university's role in something that is more profound, and yet so fundamental. That is higher education's role in fostering intentional human connection between people from all over the world, through a shared commitment to excellence in in discovery and learning."

Zaman discussed BU's connections to people globally. He recalled that Afghan refugees to his native Pakistan have suffered for 40 years, and described how his center applies convergent research to better the lives of displaced people. Zaman studies how to improve access to and the quality of drugs and how to develop equitable access to diagnostic tools; other CFD-affiliated faculty research how displacement shapes health, access, and human well-being to find best practices for aid workers on the ground. "When we put the human being and their dignity at the center of this all," he said, "we recognize that solutions that are likely to succeed and ease the suffering need to bring ideas and tools from a variety of disciplines, to converge in meaningful ways that create a lasting impact."

Muhammad Zaman, a College of Engineering HHMI Professor of Biomedical Engineering and Global Health and director of BU's Center on Forced Displacement, described research being conducted by the center to help refugees throughout the world.

Cuevas-Trisán pledged his commitment to human connection in his newly created office. He recalled for the audience that, as a lawyer for Motorola, working with different countries and cultures, he learned that "people are the lifeblood of an organization.

"I learned that values embodied in actions and decisions define culture," he said. "Across cultures, languages, and continents, I witnessed how work dignifies, how purpose uplifts, and above all, how people give their best when they feel respected, seen, and heard." He came to BU this year because Gilliam and other leaders were committed to these ideals. "I'll strive to fulfill a different BU promise: the creation of a global, healthy, human-centered community whose members-across all differences-find common ground as BU citizens."

Manuel Cuevas-Trisán, BU's inaugural senior vice president for people, belonging, and culture, pledged to work for a "human-centered community" during the Presidential Address.

Noel opened the event with a look at how BU successfully confronted previous challenges. He cited the trustees creating the forerunner of the College of Arts & Sciences in 1872, just five weeks after the Great Boston Fire destroyed the estate intended to endow the new University. Noel also noted the recruiting in the 1950s of Howard Thurman (Hon.'67) as Marsh Chapel's dean. Thurman, the first African American dean at a mostly white US university and a mentor to BU's most famous alumnus, Martin Luther King, Jr. (GRS'55, Hon.'59), reversed the chapel's lackluster attendance.

Sean Noel, the University's archivist, put the current era in the context of past challenges that BU has surmounted.

Pillar 1: Academic and Intellectual Destination

In the video, Miguel Jimenez, an ENG assistant professor of biomedical engineering and materials science and engineering, discussed his work creating devices that employ living cells to monitor soil and human health and for industrial applications. He came to BU, he said, because his interdisciplinary research found top-of-their-field collaborators across academic disciplines. The video also spotlighted, among other programs, BU's Artificial Intelligence Development Accelerator (AIDA), which teaches AI literacy to students; the expanded Undergraduate Research Opportunities Program, connecting faculty mentors across schools with students for independent research; Launchpad, which offered Boston-area summer internships this year to an inaugural cohort of rising sophomores; and BU's new Office for the Arts, overseeing the suffusion of art into classrooms, public spaces, and campus design.

Pillar 2: Globally and Externally Engaged

The video's vignettes included the new International Advisory Board to BU's trustees and leadership, elevating the University's global presence and engagement; the Frederick S. Pardee School of Global Studies' recent agreements with international institutions to expand beyond study abroad into research collaborations and joint programs across BU's 17 schools and colleges; the efforts by BU and its chief teaching hospital, Boston Medical Center (BMC), to expand services to BMC's diverse patients and give medical students multicultural exposure; and the Faculty of Computing & Data Sciences' collaboration with MassMutual to research responsible data uses.

The address was presented to an audience at Tsai Performance Center and to people watching live online.

Pillar 3: World-Class Community of Talent

This video included comments from Colin Duckett, BU's new provost and chief academic officer and a globally renowned immunologist and molecular biologist. Duckett was drawn here by Gilliam's description of BU as "Boston's University," underpinning the vital role it plays in the community. The video also showed Michael Chang, an assistant professor of language and literacy education at BU Wheelock College of Education & Human Development, who received the inaugural Margaret McGuire Earl Career Development Professorship for his scholarship on AI-supported teaching and learning; and Emilie Townes, Martin Luther King, Jr. Professor of Religion and Black Studies at the School of Theology, discussing development of a religion and African studies course that is open to students at all BU schools. The audience also heard about career readiness initiatives for students, expansion of the Institute for Excellence in Teaching & Learning, and the new Faculty First Institute, which onboards new faculty members across colleges, ranks, and disciplines.

Pillar 4: Operational Excellence

The final video detailed the University's rethinking how it operates. Examples: Orientation has been reimagined to be more immersive, holistic, and convenient for students and families. New physical spaces are being planned adjacent to each other, when appropriate, to allow faculty, students, and staff unprecedented connection and collaboration. BU is teaching AI and making it accessible to students, faculty, and staff through initiatives like AI at BU-an online, certificate-granting course introducing incoming students to the tech's fundamentals-and TerrierGPT, an AI-powered chatbot platform for the entire BU community. And the University is rebuilding its budgeting process, breaking down silos in which schools and units managed their own spending plans, which impeded strategic planning and responses to changing conditions.

Violinist Leqing Wang (CFA'27) performed during the event, highlighting the importance of the arts to Gilliam and BU.

"You Power Us Forward"

Gilliam closed her address by explaining the purpose of the many changes embodied in the four pillars: "Our transformation is about embedding humanity in the daily experiences that shape our faculty, our students, and staff. It's about building opportunities for greater connection into our physical campus too, so that our students feel embedded in a culture and a space predicated on a sense of belonging.

"I have no doubt that Boston University will emerge stronger because of your ideas, your wisdom, and your values. Our history steadies us. Our values guide us. And all of you, you power us forward. Because that is what we do, and what we have always done. We and so many others here and around the world-we are Boston University's future.

"Now, let's seize it."

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