My name is Erin Driver-Linn, and I am no longer the Director
of HILT. Yes, I am the dean for education at the Harvard T.H.
Chan School of Public Health--
best school in the entire university.
[LAUGHTER]
It's got an amazing, amazing mission.
Amazing students, amazing faculty.
I'm having a great time five weeks in.
I have the honor of introducing our new president.
Many of you will have been reading lots about him.
Many of you will be attending his inauguration
and you'll hear more about him.
There is a bio in the program, so I'm not
going to do the standard introduction.
I will tell you a little story about the first time
I met President Bacow.
It was in 2011-- and he will not remember this one.
He remembers a lot of things, but he will not
remember this one.
It was at a kind of event, and there was a buffet table.
And I was talking with a friend of mine,
and she said, that's Larry Bacow.
And I said, oh.
And she said, do you know who he is?
And he said, no.
[LAUGHTER]
She said, just joined the corporation.
Former president of Tufts.
Used to be at MIT.
I was like, oh, wow.
I probably should have known who he was.
She said, I want to say hi.
Do you think that would be too forward?
I said, I don't know, do you know him?
And she's like, a little bit.
But I think he remembers people, and I think he'd be OK.
[LAUGHTER]
And then she said, he's the kind of person I want to work for.
And I said, why?
And she said, because I'd learned a lot.
And I said, in a good way?
[LAUGHTER]
And she said, absolutely in a good way.
He is through and through an educator.
And no offense, not in that like teaching and learning way,
but really, he knows stuff.
He's a role model, and he gets stuff done.
And I really remembered that.
She interrupted him as he was loading up his plate
and reintroduced herself.
And introduced me quickly and I gracefully left.
But I remember that.
All of those components, the educator through and through,
not in the teaching and learning way,
which is kind of interesting.
And that he deeply cares about learning and teaching
and it's part of who he is.
And so we invited him to our first TILT conference,
and he said yes and he came quickly.
And-- I mean, he answered quickly, not everybody does.
Since he's been more part of my mattering map,
I've had the great occasion of working with him several times.
And the thing is, so many of you have also had that.
And it's another part of my observation
here, which is that he--
President Barkow engages.
He shows up, he is involved, he is constantly
learning from all of us, from every interaction,
and he's constantly teaching.
And I am really excited about this next phase of Harvard's
history, and what we're going to do
with this institution in this next era.
And I am happy that he is at the helm.
And you'll have to forgive me for this,
I hope he also has a hand on the HILT.
Please join me in welcoming President Bacow.
[APPLAUSE]
Wow.
I've been introduced quite a few times recently, here at Harvard
and elsewhere, but I don't think I've ever
had an introduction quite as nicer or as personal
as that one, Erin, so thank you very, very much.
It's really great to be here on so many different levels.
As Erin said, I was present here at the very first HILT
conference.
And Erin really helped to bring this whole enterprise
into the world.
And when we think about what we do with our lives
and what we accomplished and the people that we influence, Erin,
through your good work, through helping to elevate teaching
and learning on the agenda for Harvard,
you've had a profound impact on a place
that I think really matters, and I think all of us
should thank you at this point for helping
to make this happen.
[APPLAUSE]
But nobody gets anything done on their own,
and there are other people who've
been involved here as well.
And I just want to take a minute and acknowledge
Peter Bol, Harvard's first Vice Provost
for Advances in Learning.
And I also want to acknowledge his successor,
and that's Bharat Anana and his colleague Dustin Tingly,
who I think are going to continue
the great work that Peter and Erin have really
started on our behalf.
As I like to say, nothing succeeds
in life like a successor.
And we are fortunate that we have good ones here.
As Erin mentioned, and I also just alluded to,
I was fortunate to be here for the very first HILT
conference in 2012.
What she didn't mention, though, is that that was actually
my first public appearance as a member of the Harvard
Corporation anywhere.
So this is where I--
like my coming out as a corporation member.
And I remember serving on a panel with Youngme Moon,
with Alan Garber, and with Michael Sandel.
And in retrospect, the title of the panel
was quite prescient, because it said--
it was entitled-- remember this?
"Looking to the Future."
Now I must say, I could not have imagined this future [LAUGHS]
at the time, but as I often say to my students,
the best piece of career advice I can give them
is to recognize opportunity when it walks up and hits you
in the face.
And in the interest of full disclosure,
I did not go looking for this job,
but I also could not turn away from it,
because these are difficult and challenging times for higher
education.
I see this as an opportunity not just to lead Harvard,
but to be an advocate for the enduring values of colleges
and universities and higher education more
broadly as enablers of the American dream for so
many of us.
And I would hope that all of you would see that
as part of your work, your mission
as well in trying to advance teaching and learning.
But here I am.
I should also disclose to you that this is the Harvard
Initiative for learning and teaching,
but it was really kicked off by two extraordinary people, Gus
and Rita Hauser, whose gift made this possible.
And again, the world is connected
in very interesting ways.
I was the first Hauser Leader-in-Residence
at the Kennedy School after I stepped down
as president of Tufts.
And so I remember at the HILT conference thanking
Gus and Rita for their generous gift, which made
all of this good work possible.
And then I had a second opportunity
to thank them when I was appointed as the Hauser
Leader-in-Residence.
And now that while they're not here,
maybe they're watching, because Rita is very
good at watching things online.
Gus and Rita, thank you again for all
that you have made possible.
I was talking to Bob Kerrey, who you will hear from a little bit
later today, about some of the challenges
that we face in higher education--
as we face as Harvard.
And one of them is that we are perceived as elite
at a time in which that has become a dirty word
in the United States.
In fact, I like to say, the only thing
which seems to be an appropriate word to be modified by elite
is quarterback.
To be an elite university is bad,
to have an elite quarterback, that's OK, people like that.
And I prefer to think that what we stand for is not elite,
but rather, we stand for excellence.
We stand for excellence in everything that we do here.
And one of the things which I feel so good about with respect
to HILT is that you have really elevated
our commitment to excellence in teaching and learning.
And just looking at what's happened in the seven years
since the very first conference, people
are talking about how do students learn.
We're digging into data, we're mucking around
and trying to understand the information, the meaning of all
the clicks and the online work that's being done,
and sorting through the big data that way.
In thinking about how we teach, especially with technology
that's forced us to reflect much harder about how
we organize our information.
What are our students actually learning?
And so I think this is an incredibly interesting time
at Harvard, as faculty and students and staff and others
are really focused in a very concentrated, deep way
in trying to understand how we can do a better job to help
our students learn--
how we understand different ways in which our students learn,
because one of the things which we appreciate
to a much greater degree is that not all students
learn the same way.
How do we adapt our teaching so that--
and now I will use an MIT term-- there is a far better impedance
match between what we're trying to-- the information we're
trying to convey and the way in which our students understand
it.
We become sensitive to all of those things.
And as a result, I think we're a much better institution
as a result.
But I want to issue a challenge for all of you
today in your work.
And the challenge is this--
the reality is, only a very, very small number of students
are ever going to study at Harvard.
And so the challenge is, how do we
think about what we are doing here
and what we are learning here, how
can we ensure that that benefits all of the students who
are seeking to get an education in the United States?
Four out of five kids in the US are
going to be educated at the great public universities
of America.
And I think it's imperative that we take on
as our responsibility that what we do here
translates elsewhere.
That we reach out, we extend ourselves,
we try and help other institutions,
and that we do so as true partners, OK?
Not we're from Harvard and we figured out how to do it
and here we are, but rather where
we engage with other institutions
as humble partners, as generous partners, where
we try to learn from them and we try to share what we have
learned here with them as well.
That is a true partnership.
Because we need to ensure that the lessons that we learn here
benefit and help everybody, and the education of students
who will never set foot in Harvard Yard,
never even see the city of Cambridge.
So today I ask that you begin thinking through some
of these questions, some of these critical issues, which
are so important, I think, for all of us in higher education--
for the values that we stand for,
and I hope you will also help to join me
as we seek to try and change this narrative about higher
education.
That to help people understand that we
exist not to make Harvard great, but rather
to make the world better.
And that that, ultimately, is what we are doing here today.
So thank you very much for inviting me to join you.
Good luck with the work that you will do today.
I'm sorry that my schedule will not
permit me to sit in and attend, but I
have the privilege of ending my day with Erin wearing
her other hat at the School of Public Health,
and she's told me that she's going
to give me a full and complete report on your conversations.
So thank you all very much and have a great day.
Take care.
[APPLAUSE]