Updates from the President

Kicking off this month's update is the tremendous news that ASU received a history-making $215 million in gifts during the 2016 fiscal year. This tops last year's $200+ million in gifts and provides even greater supplementary resources to enhance our academic, discovery and service aspirations. Through the generous and steadfast support of more than 100,000 individual, corporate and foundation donors, nearly one-quarter of whom are ASU alumni, our extended university community has communicated its faith and excitement in our ability to generate life-changing differences by working together.

I am deeply grateful to the ASU Foundation and everyone who has given of their time, energy and resources to transform ASU and realize its institutional commitment to excellence, access and impact. The opportunities, scholarships, facilities and experiences these gifts make possible empower our students, faculty and community to succeed at unprecedented levels, and I look forward to sharing every new and increasingly significant marker of our progress.

Among those who have taken special note of ASU’s quality and the talent of our student body and alumni is the Ford Motor Company. This summer, Ford announced its addition of ASU to its list of premier schools and top-tierrecruiting and hiring institutions. In doing so, ASU joins the ranks of MIT, Notre Dame, UC Berkeley and Purdue, among other prestigious universities.

I’m pleased to add that Ford is not alone in recognizing ASU’s ascension in terms of graduation rates, national and world higher education rankings and research growth. As of today, more than 40 respected corporations have also designated ASU a premier school and top resource for recruiting and hiring. Other corporations, like Allstate Insurance, are tapping into our well-spring of innovation in other exciting and meaningful ways.

As we continue working to prepare students to be master learners, individuals capable of creatively thinking through any challenge and advancing solutions we want more and more national and international companies will recognize ASU as a valuable source of quality thinkers and leaders, and we are currentlydeveloping new strategies to help amplify that message in the marketplace.

Beyond the private sector, ASU’s ongoing commitment to evolving effective alliances in support of comprehensive economic development was also recently recognized by the Association of Public and Land-Grant Universities (APLU), a national organization that supports the work of public universities in North America. Earlier this month, APLU named ASU to its 2016 class of Innovation & Prosperity Universities, a designation that – after a rigorous self-assessment and independent review process –acknowledges universities for working with the public and private sector strengthen economic opportunity through entrepreneurship, tech transfer, community engagement and workforce development.

Honors like these are important because they help substantiate our long-range institutional efforts to evolve a culture of innovation at ASU. We believe that real world change can only happen through perpetual re-assessment and innovation. Examples of this mindset are evident across ASU, most recently in an update produced by Arizona Technology Enterprises (AzTE), our tech transfer arm, which stated that:

• Nearly 100 companies have been launched based on ASU technologies (including Fluidic Energy pictured above)

• More than $600 million has been raised in external funding, including an ASU record of $96 million in FY 16

• More than 500 people are now employed at ASU-linked startups

We’re proud of this progress and the tremendous work underway throughout ASU to make Arizona and our nation more competitive and successful.

With so many current conversations revolving around bi-national relations with Mexico, ASU remains committed to consequential global engagement. As a demonstrated leader in new energy, water and food systems, and advanced building and health technologies, ASU continues to establish critical international alliances to rethink higher education and generate new and better solutions to complex issues.

In line with these efforts, ASU recently formalized an agreement with Mexico's Secretary of Energy to become a key partner on energy research and education. ASU was honored to host Leonardo Beltrán Rodríguez, undersecretary for planning and energy transition under Mexico's Secretary of Energy (SENER), to formalize our partnership.

Our collaboration will include a coordinated effort between ASU, SENER, Mexican higher education institutions and state government agencies to provide degree and certificate programs to develop the workforce needed in Mexico to address strategic energy needs. As Mexico continues to pursue energy reform, it will need additional expertise representing the full engineering spectrum. In support, ASU will deploy education programs and expert researchers from our Fulton Schools of Engineering, the largest engineering school in the U.S., and our Julie Ann Wrigley Global Institute of Sustainability, home to the nation's first School of Sustainability. Our alliance will also allow for shared growth in valuable energy and sustainability research.

ASU is excited to engage with Mexico in this important work and to continue building our portfolio of joint academic and research partnerships going forward.