Dear Faculty, Staff, Alumni and Friends,
For starters, congratulations to all our May 2026 graduates! I write this having just returned from the commencement ceremony, where there were a lot of hugs and tears. It’s always moving to share this huge threshold moment. Our May newsletter will also feature some of the most outstanding graduates, and I encourage you to read about their journeys at Clemson. Congratulations also to all the family and friends who supported our graduates through the years. But my biggest thanks go to the faculty and staff of the College.
Salute to our faculty and staff
For this last Dean’s Corner for the 2025-26 academic year, I want to devote the remaining space to salute the College faculty and staff. Here you can see a listing of all the faculty and staff who won College awards and were recognized at our recent College Meeting at the end of April. I congratulate them, but I would also like to recognize and thank the remaining faculty and staff of the College as well.
This has been a difficult year. Higher education across the nation has faced and continues to face a series of challenges that dwarf the hostility the arts and humanities have faced since forever. This includes severely reduced federal funding, demographic shifts impacting enrollment numbers, a loss of public trust and confidence in the value of a college degree. Compounding this is the meteoric rise of the capabilities offered by artificial intelligence engines that seem poised to transform how we might even understand the concept of education. All this makes for an unsettling present and an uncertain future.
The challenges we work to overcome here in Clemson are part of a much wider picture that has humbled august and unimaginably wealthy institutions within the past year. Smaller, more exposed universities are simply shutting their doors permanently.
Given all this and the inescapable impact on morale, I am deeply moved to note that the work our faculty and staff do, the passion they show, the commitment they demonstrate every day continues unabated. For that reason, and contrary to what we might expect given the conditions, there is much to celebrate and be grateful for, including the continued growth in student demand for our undergraduate programs in CAH.
Why do we do what we do? There is surely no single answer here. Everyone will have their own, and that is what is beautiful about the arts and humanities. Both are rooted in the human experience — everyone’s experience is unique, and yet connected and relatable. Maybe AI is ultimately good news for the arts and humanities, as it might compel us to remember what being a human is all about.
The classroom is a sacred space for us to gather, often in response to a work of art or a product of deep, complex and creative thinking that we have the chance to experience and reflect on together. How beautiful is that?! The concept for the “liberal arts” comes from the Latin “Libertas” (liberty), because this education liberates us from ignorance and prepares us to be thoughtful family members, friends, neighbors, citizens, leaders. I am grateful to live in a world and at a place where that is still possible, and grateful to our faculty and staff for all their work, efforts and sacrifice to make all this a reality.
Go Tigers!
Nicholas Vazsonyi, Dean
