Dr. Charles Wright was inaugurated as Salisbury University’s ninth president yesterday.
He committed himself to improving the affordability of a college education.
“Some universities are already at the point where the return on financial investment is seriously questioned, he said. “We need to make certain that money is never an insurmountable object, a barrier, to college education. We need to creative this opportunity for every student who is willing to commit to a plan of study, work hard and succeed.”
In addition he called for a true culture of inclusion and building partnerships with the community. Wright said some of those initiative have already been started beginning with the new Center for Equity, Justice and Inclusion at the Blackwell Library.
He declared that, “No university can fulfill its true potential for educational excellence unless it embraces that idea that the best learning occurs when we gather people together from different backgrounds, different experiences, different cultures, different races, different religions and different nationalities, to have respectful conversations about our differences.”
In addition, Wright noted a new collaboration with the University of Maryland Eastern Shore including what he called, Delmarva Media Collaboration, that looks to a partnership between Delmarva Public Radio at SU and WESM on the UMES campus.
Wright succeeds Dr. Janet Dudley-Eshbach who served for 18 years at the helm of the university.
Wright said he spent his first 100 days listening and getting acquainted with the institution.
Full Address by Dr. Charles Wright at Inauguration
