February 25, 2021
by Jere W. Morehead, President
As an educator and administrator at the University of Georgia for over 30 years, I have been privileged to work with some of the best students in the nation. UGA students in all disciplines bring ingenuity and a drive to make a difference. When these qualities combine with the unparalleled educational opportunities here, what our students can achieve is limitless.
In the current academic year alone, UGA students have won four major national awards, including the Rhodes Scholarship (UGA’s 25th), the Gates Cambridge Scholarship, the Schwarzman Scholarship, and the Churchill Scholarship. Equally remarkable is the breadth of disciplines these outstanding students represent: education, business, political science, Arabic, classics, biology, biochemistry, and genetics.
Undergraduates in every school and college at UGA benefit from experiential learning, such as research, internships, study abroad, and service-learning, that connects their academic foundations to the world beyond the classroom. In addition, UGA’s culture of mentoring means that faculty are excited to share their knowledge in a variety of ways and partner with students on new projects.
One example that comes to mind is the Small Satellite Research Laboratory, which was started by three students who set out to build a spacecraft in 2015. With guidance from faculty in UGA’s Center for Geospatial Research, they obtained funding from NASA and the Air Force Research Lab to design two space-ready satellites. The student-led SSRL has since grown to include more than 100 students and 15 faculty members, and last fall they launched their first research satellite into space on the Antares rocket.
The University of Georgia continues to set new standards in higher education, just as our students continue to inspire me every day. All of us here are committed to creating a learning environment in which our students can accomplish anything they can imagine.