Hello, colleagues and friends across the University of Michigan community.

A healthy, vibrant democracy begins with a choice. A choice to listen respectfully, to speak constructively, to think, to act, to engage. It’s a choice we can make each day. And through our choices, we can change our nation, we can transform our world, we can shape our society. That’s why we’ve launched the Year of Democracy, Civic Empowerment, and Global Engagement.

This is an essential initiative for the University. It is also a vital part of our efforts under Vision 2034, through which we will seek to become the defining public university. So throughout the year, we will build on our story tradition of activism and social change, while fostering constructive conversations across diverse perspectives, deep listening and learning, as well as respectful and spirited dialogue and debate.

We will also be hosting a range of events across the campus, designed to inform, inspire, and educate, to help each of us appreciate the vital role we can play in addressing the critical challenges facing our nation today. You can learn more about those opportunities and activities at the initiatives website, democracy.umich.edu. I also encourage you to check out our Dialogues In Democracy an interdisciplinary collection of the University of Michigan Press books that explore the core tensions in American political culture. I hope we’ll understand the incredible opportunity that each of us has to live under democratic governance, as well as our requisite responsibilities.

The year is being led by co-chair Jenna Bednar, who also serves as Faculty Director of UMICH Votes and Democratic Engagement, along with Celeste Watkins-Hayes, the Dean of the Ford School, and Rosario Ceballo, Dean of LS&A.

The success of this year depends on each of us, but it would not have come together without the incredible efforts of these co-chairs and their teams. That’s why they’re this month’s Portrait of a Wolverine. They’re here to talk more about the importance of this year and how we can become engaged.

Thank you President Ono, for your support of democracy and support of this initiative this year.

When I watch our students line up to vote, across the street at the art museum, that gives me hope in our future. They are our future. And to know that our university facilitates that, empowers our students to engage in this process, I’m just so proud of that. That we do that.

Yeah, absolutely. To go from a history of struggle around who has access to voting, for example, and to continue to have these debates and struggles in the present day, and then to be able to make sure that our students have that access and have that connection, but also at an institution that connects it historically, in terms of the significance of what they’re doing and what they’re able to participate in, and to be thoughtful for those who continue to struggle. To have that voice, to have that right. Linking back, it connects to my roots and my family’s roots in civil rights work and all of the conversations that happen all the time on this campus in terms of why they are here at the University of Michigan. And the responsibility they hopefully feel as students, as faculty and staff, to really take advantage of what we have here at the University and the platform that we have as a University.

Yeah, it’s building that sense of responsibility. It’s truly in your hands, right? And your collective hands. And so that’s the other piece of what we’re really trying to build this year, is a collective responsibility through promotion of a democratic culture. But we knew we didn’t wanna just have a year of events. We wanted, as, as Celeste said, we wanted it to be a bridge to the future, connecting our past, built on our past, and that therefore those events, you know, in addition to lifting up the knowledge creation and dissemination that we do, and building the sense of agency, it’s also a supported agency because you are in an environment where others see and value democracy the way you do. So it’s really a very social experience and a positive small d, democratic, in the sense of rising above partisanship to embrace the importance of democracy.

So we encourage you to go to our website, democracy.umich.edu. You will find events, you’ll find funding opportunities. You’ll find all kinds of ways to get involved.

And we actually encourage you to go back to the Democracy website because it’s gonna be updated throughout the year. So check it once, twice, keep checking.

And I just wanna close by reminding you that democracy is for all of us, but it depends on you.

Thank you again, Professor Bednar and Deans Ceballo and Watkins-Hayes. As we turn to the critical days ahead of the election, let us conclude as we began. The success of our democracy depends upon each of us, and it depends on the choices we make every day. So let’s join together in this Year of Democracy, Civic Empowerment, and Global Engagement. Let us listen, let us act, let us engage. Let us strengthen our nation. Let us shape our world, and let us lift our society.