The American University of Beirut (AUB) inaugurated its 160th academic year on Monday, September 1, 2025, with an opening ceremony at Assembly Hall. Trustees, faculty, students, alumni, and friends gathered to mark a milestone that links the university’s historic roots to its present-day resilience.
The ceremony featured the traditional academic procession followed by an address from AUB president Dr Fadlo Khuri, titled “In the Moment.” In his speech, Khuri reflected on the pressures faced by individuals and institutions in Lebanon and beyond, emphasising that adversity can serve as a catalyst for growth.
“Here in Lebanon, and here at AUB, embracing the present is often not a choice but a necessity,” Khuri told the audience. “By bringing awareness and purpose to that moment, we gain insight, and with insight comes the strength to build.”
Khuri acknowledged that pressure touches all corners of society, from students studying late into the night to families enduring illness and financial strain, and nations confronting political upheaval. He argued that while such demands weigh heavily, they also shape the future for generations to come.
Drawing on AUB’s origins, Khuri recalled missionary William McClure Thomson’s proposal for a college in Beirut in 1862 and founding president Daniel Bliss’s determination to launch what became the Syrian Protestant College in 1866.
“Picture it: no grand Assembly Hall, no sweeping green overlooking the Mediterranean,” Khuri said. “Just a simple room, 16 young men eager to learn, a handful of faculty from abroad and the Levant, and a president determined to seize the moment.”
He highlighted Bliss’s perseverance during years of turmoil, including the American Civil War and sectarian conflict in the Levant, which tested but did not derail the college’s founding. Bliss’s ability to endure pressure, Khuri suggested, remains a lesson for today.
Turning to his own decade as AUB president, Khuri described how Lebanon’s economic collapse and political instability, alongside crises affecting students and families, have tested the institution. Yet he maintained that the pressures of recent years had sharpened AUB’s focus on its mission.
“For all we have endured, we are today a more excellent, inclusive, diverse, and distributed university,” he said. “We have not only survived but emerged more unified, more mission-oriented, and more committed to that mission than we have been for some time.”
Khuri closed by urging the community to embrace the new academic year with resilience and presence. “Let us take the opportunities before us, learn from the pressures that shape us, and build, in every small and grand way, the future we imagine. Today, this moment, is very much ours to own.”
The event marked not only the start of another year of scholarship, service, and discovery but also reaffirmed AUB’s identity as an institution forged in times of challenge, now stepping into its 160th year with renewed purpose.
