Notes for Remarks— North Country Scholar Day
Daniel F. Sullivan— November 5, 2003

• It’s great to see you all here today. This is a real North Country Day—the kind that builds character and makes us special—the kind that makes us better than other people!
• I want to use my time this morning to share with you some reflections on a university that has been very important to me for over 40 years. I’m a graduate of St. Lawrence in the Class of 1965, with a major in mathematics and a minor in English. My doctorate is from Columbia University in sociology. I am a sociologist of science by training, but my teaching has included such sub-fields as comparative-historical sociology, the sociology of medicine, and, in anthropology, cultural ecology. My Ph.D. was made possible because of a fellowship I received through St. Lawrence from the Edward John Noble Foundation. Edward John Noble, who grew up in Governeur and founded the Life Saver Company, was Chair of the St. Lawrence Board of Trustees in the early 1950’s. Our current student center, about to be converted into new space for the arts when we move into the new student center in January, is named for him, and many North Country hospitals bear his name. The partnership between Edward John Noble and St. Lawrence is just one of hundreds of ways in which St. Lawrence and the North Country are wonderfully intertwined.

My life was changed profoundly by this north country university. I can’t tell you how terrific it is now to be back as president. My wife and I plan to retire in the North Country someday.

• A bit of the history of the University:
• Founded in 1856, people of the town, the Universalist Church , and the State of New York .
• Universalist values promoting inclusiveness, equal opportunity, equity, justice and fairness are very much part of our heritage.
• Women admitted from the beginning. Olympia Brown the first woman ordained a minister in America .
• First two graduates in 1865 both men: Lowville and Manhattan .
• Just as, I’m sure, your view of the world is profoundly influenced by the fact that you live in the North Country, so has St. Lawrence been profoundly shaped by its location in the North Country.
• Today, 17% of our students are North Country students and the level of interest in St. Lawrence by North Country students is growing annually. More and more students like you are considering St. Lawrence.
• Interestingly, a much higher proportion of our North Country students major in science and mathematics than is true for the student body as a whole. Perhaps the physical beauty of the North Country leads students who grow up here to want to understand nature. We welcome them with open arms, and provide for them one of the nation’s finest undergraduate programs in science and mathematics—a program that in the next few years will be provided with outstanding new and renovated facilities. New buildings for biology, chemistry, neuroscience, and biochemistry will be under construction by September of 2004, and the rest of our science and mathematics facilities will be renovated subsequently.
• When people ask me what’s different and special about St. Lawrence, most of what I say in response has to do with our location:
• Ottawa and Canada ;
• The outdoors, Adirondack Semester;
• Overseas study in 14 locations, including a new opportunity in China
• Writing
• Great strength in the field sciences, taking advantage of our location
• Broad and deep programs of athletics and recreation, in response to the highly physically active students we have, attracted by our North Country location.
• The most effective colleges are academically demanding and highly focused on students. [elaborate]
• And we plan to be accessible financially and comfortable for North Country students—a place North Country students feel is home. North Country students do wonderfully here. Our roots go deep and we respect our roots greatly. We hope you will strongly consider extending your North Country roots by coming to this outstanding North Country university.

Conclusion.