August 18, 2025
Dear Tulane Community:
We are excited to welcome everyone to the 2025-26 academic year and especially those students, faculty and staff who are new to Tulane. You are now part of a very special community. We enter this new academic year with a renewed sense of purpose. Tulane continues to enjoy extraordinary success: from the caliber of the students and faculty we attract, to the life-changing research and scholarship we produce, to the transformative educational programs we offer and the positive impact our alumni make on the world. We have never been stronger as a university. The evidence of our progress is all around us, from the record number of applications for our undergraduate, graduate and professional programs, and the continually improving academic accomplishments of our students, to the dramatic new records in external research funding attracted by our faculty, and the excellent clinical care we provide. There has also been a marked increase in citations of our faculty’s work in both academic journals and the public media, as well as unprecedented increases in philanthropic support from a growing community of supporters who are excited about what they are seeing at Tulane and want to be a part of our mission and future.
Tulane succeeds not by looking like other universities, but by building on our distinctive strengths. These include our ability to nurture a deeply relational community – one of the many features we inherit from our hometown – in which all Tulanians engage with, and learn from, others with different experiences and perspectives. We couple this with our profound commitment to academic excellence that transcends boundaries. This creates an environment where students and scholars reach across disciplines and fields to innovate beyond the scope of any single individual’s or school’s analysis and imagination and make singular contributions to the most pressing issues facing our world. Our success provides a compelling example of why American universities continue to be the envy of the world.
In a “welcome back” letter such as this we would usually go into greater detail about all the wonderful initiatives currently moving Tulane forward. However, in light of the extensive debates occurring in the country about higher education, we wanted to place our current upward trajectory in the broader context of our core mission and the fundamental institutional values that support our success, both now and in the future. This is a period in which universities, like few other times in our history, are being asked to clarify their role in society. Higher education is being challenged to justify the significant investments it requires from students and their families, as well as federal, state and local government, to carry out its mission. Our work ahead must include a more focused effort to articulate our crucial value and find ways that engage the varied needs, interests and aspirations of our many stakeholders. These include students, parents, faculty, staff and alumni, as well as those who employ our graduates, apply our research, and engage with us throughout society. We must be clear about what makes universities in general – and Tulane in particular – vitally important.
Our story must always begin with our unwavering commitment to academic excellence.
It has long been understood that the ability of universities to carry out their core mission, to ambitiously pursue truth, wisdom and understanding, rests on our capacity to create an environment that supports and encourages open and vigorous dialogue and debate over a range of issues. In the same vein, the educational experience we offer should not have the goal of imposing on our community a shared, singular version of the truth, but rather to help our students grow as independent critical thinkers. The increasing polarization of our society continually threatens this essential feature of higher education, and so we again confirm our absolute commitment to academic freedom. This means that our faculty members are free to explore ideas as they think best and enter those ideas – even those which may be controversial or unpopular – into the conversation. Our faculty are also free to, in fact are encouraged to comment, in their role as members of the Tulane faculty, on issues of public concern related to their areas of scholarly interests. This sharing of knowledge and insight is one of the many contributions a university makes to its communities. Likewise, all members of our community are free to speak according to their conscience in public or private, but when doing so should take appropriate steps to clarify that they are not speaking for the institution or any Tulane unit and should avoid inappropriate use of their Tulane position to broadcast or amplify their personal views.
In a campus-wide message last year we stressed the value of universities refraining from weighing in, as institutions, on political or partisan debates. In doing so, we reiterated the importance of institutional neutrality. Such principled neutrality, which has been adopted by most major universities across the country, means that Tulane will not take an official position on any issue that is not directly related to its core academic functions. Institutional neutrality is vital in preserving a climate in which true academic freedom can thrive. When a university does not take an official position, members of its community know that they are free to speak out on public issues without fear of transgressing an institutionally sanctioned position.
Another value of principled neutrality has increasingly come to the fore. It is well known that there are debates and negotiations taking place in Washington and around the country that may dramatically impact our university. These include foundational questions about the future of federal financial aid for students, funding for research and for the essential support and infrastructure required for that work, as well as our ability to recruit and retain international students and scholars. It is precisely our adherence to the principle of institutional neutrality on partisan issues not related to higher education that has allowed us to engage effectively with a range of policy leaders on these issues that are most directly related to our mission. Institutional neutrality creates a context that best allows us to advance the most significant interests of the university.
The notions of institutional neutrality and academic freedom each contain nuances and unclear boundaries, which, like all important ideas, should be the subject of ongoing conversation. But their complexities should not diminish our commitment to the core principles – principles which are key elements of our work to ensure that Tulane’s stature as one of our nation’s leading research universities continues to grow. This work requires recruiting students, faculty and staff of extraordinary potential and creating an environment in which they can thrive, and continuously enhance the quality of our educational offerings and our research. Working together, we can ensure that a Tulane degree remains one of the most recognized and valued in the world, and that a Tulane faculty affiliation forcefully amplifies the reach and impact of our research.
The nature of higher education has changed quite a bit over the past millennia, but from ancient philosophical treatises to the development of AI, university-led exploration and discovery have continually enhanced our understanding and expanded the universe of what is possible. The questions our society is facing have very high stakes and the world has never needed universities such as Tulane more. We look forward to building more bridges together this academic year and continuing to fulfill our crucial role as a source of growth, opportunity and progress.
Michael A. Fitts, President
Robin Forman, Senior Vice President for Academic Affairs and Provost
Patrick Norton, Senior Vice President/Chief Operating Officer/Treasurer
