In his regular report to the Board of Trustees, President Carter recapped his investiture ceremony and outlined the framework for the “Education for Citizenship” strategic plan that he will release in July.

Thank you, Chairman Zeiger. And good morning.

I want to add my welcome and congratulations to the new trustees joining us today, Kara Trott and Kendall Buchan. We are fortunate to have such talented and dedicated people serving The Ohio State University.

Trustee Trott, Trustee Buchan – of course, neither of you is a stranger to our university, as the Chairman described earlier. We look forward to continuing to work with you to define the future of higher education here at Ohio State.

You are coming on board at an incredible time for our university. I want to spend just a few minutes telling you why I think that’s the case.

We’ve had a busy few months since our last Board meeting, culminating in our investiture celebration two weeks ago where we had an opportunity, for the first time, to share a vision for where we want Ohio State to go in the next decade.

I want to thank Chairman Zeiger and the entire Board again for hosting such a wonderful event. I know our team worked incredibly hard to plan every detail. Lynda and I are so grateful to every person who participated, whether in a speaking role, or those who took time to attend, or those who worked behind the scenes to make sure everything ran smoothly. It was a day our family will remember forever.

I won’t repeat my speech in full since most of you were there.

But the short version, the statement I made on that day, is that in the 10 months that I have had the privilege of serving as your 17th president, everything I have seen and heard has confirmed for me that the future of higher education is right here at Ohio State University.

This is what brought me to Ohio in the first place. We have all the tools necessary to become the new model for excellence in public higher education. A great Board, strong partners in our Governor and elected leaders, world-class faculty and students, support from alumni and friends across the community.

Let me say that word again. Excellence matters. I’m going to be talking about excellence every day that I’m in this chair. When we create a culture here at Ohio State where excellence is not just a goal but an EXPECTATION, we’re going to do big things together.

And that is the basis of the 10-year plan that we are going to build, which we are naming “Education for Citizenship 2035,” inspired by Ohio State’s motto and our commitment to being a university for all Ohioans. I was excited to be able to share the framework for that 10-year plan at my investiture.

The framework outlines six themes that we will be laser focused on going forward: academics; research and creative expression; health care; talent and culture; operations; and collegiate athletics. And I underscore academics. When academic excellence is our North Star, excellence in all other areas will follow.

We started work on our 10-year plan in January when I arrived at Ohio State. Since then I have spent a great deal of time listening and learning from every Ohioan who has a stake in the success of our university.

Everyone has had different ideas and inputs. But there is a common thread. And that is that all of Ohio needs us to be successful. I would echo what Governor DeWine said at the investiture. Ohio State creates impact that is almost impossible to measure. The Governor and I are completely aligned on this point. When we grow and innovate, so does our workforce, so do our communities, so does our entire state.

We all know about the challenges that higher education as a whole are up against. Economic challenges, demographic changes, questions around the cost and value of a college degree.

Ohio State is not exempt, although I would submit to you that we are in a better position than most.

Just look at our enrollment report this fall. We have the largest first-year class ever in our history and a total enrollment increase of 2.3 percent1. Almost two-thirds of our new students graduated in the top 10 percent of their high school class. Seventy percent of our student body is from Ohio. Students and families recognize the quality and value of an Ohio State education.

Our momentum extends well beyond enrollment.

We just announced that we are moving to a new phase of our Carmenton development, pending your approval later today. I’m excited about the vision for Carmenton to become a hub of partnerships and economic growth for Central Ohio.

Our College of Medicine has set a new record in research funding, with $477 million2. We can all take pride in our role in creating a healthier and stronger Ohio.

We are establishing a leadership role in AI, which will be one of our priorities for research and workforce growth going forward.

And I can’t talk about AI without mentioning the U.S.-Japan digital innovation summit that we recently hosted.

AI was a topic of discussion and it was a great honor to have former Chairman Fujita as one of our distinguished speakers. These are the kinds of global leadership conversations happening right here on our campus.

But as I said at my investiture, this is not the time to rest on our laurels.

Quite the opposite. We are proud of our history and traditions, but we need to be willing to acknowledge that the strategies we have used for the past 150-plus years will not work for the next 150.

Now is the time for new thinking. Chairman Zeiger said it well. The forces that will drive our path forward will be the values that all of us at Ohio State hold dear: First and foremost, excellence. And collaboration, access and affordability, transparency and integrity, diversity of people and ideas.

The best news is that in the two weeks since we rolled out our strategic planning framework, we’ve felt a palpable excitement and energy about the momentum and potential for Ohio State. Our job now is to harness that energy and turn it into a detailed plan with specific goals, initiatives and metrics that will go live on 1 July.

We have quite a bit of work ahead of us, and many more conversations with those whose expertise will help us truly put pen to paper, starting with our faculty, staff and students.

I’m happy to tell you that we have the right team in place to keep this work moving forward.

As you know, we’ve made several key appointments to our leadership team recently. These are people who are going to get things done, who act according to our values, who are here for the same reasons we are – to make Ohio State University THE national model for excellence in higher education.

First, we have Dr. Ravi Bellamkonda, who will join us as executive vice president and provost in January, pending your approval this morning. Ravi is currently the provost at Emory University and I couldn’t be more excited to have attracted him to Ohio State. I know he is eager to get to campus and begin building on the outstanding work of our faculty.

And I want to thank Dr. Karla Zadnik for her leadership in the interim. Karla has maintained our momentum without missing a beat and we owe her our gratitude.

Also pending your approval, we have appointed Chris Kabourek as our senior vice president for administration and planning. Chris is on Week 3 with us after 28 years at the University of Nebraska, where he served as interim president and chief financial officer. I know Chris well and he will be a great addition to our team.

We also thank Mark Conselyea (CON—sul—yay) for his interim leadership in A&P after Jay Kasey’s retirement earlier this year.

Finally, we named Jennifer Schlueter (SHLOO—ter) dean and director at our Marion campus, beginning next March pending your approval. Jennifer comes to us from The New School in New York City.

With Jennifer’s appointment, we have a new leadership team across all our regional campuses and I’m excited about the growth opportunities there. The regional campuses are a crucial piece of our strategy to expand access and opportunity to every single Ohio student.

With a great team on board, and ideas continuing to come in from the Buckeye community, I don’t think it’s an overstatement to say that our Education for Citizenship 2035 plan will redefine excellence in public higher education.

I look forward to regularly updating you on our progress and making the detailed plan a reality next summer. July will be here before we know it, but I have every confidence we are up to the task.

I want to thank the Board again, along with our students, faculty, and staff, and indeed all the people of Ohio, for your trust and confidence. We are going to work hard to deliver on that trust. And as I’ve told our teams, now it’s time to get to work.

With that, Mr. Chairman, I’ll turn the mic back to you.