Conclusion: the Way forward: an Ascending University: Build as high as Heaven!
The long war finally ends!
The War ended on August 15, 1945 with the surrender of Japan: the world, and specifically the Middle East would never come to be again what it had been before the war. In the years to come, AUB will continue to transform itself into an ascending and most indispensable regional academic center, providing its graduates, who would go on to staff key positions in Lebanon, the Arab world, and the region, with a stellar liberal arts educaiton, hoping to equip them for a rapidly changing, increasingly complex, and indeed difficult world that the second half of the twentieth century turned to be.
The aftermath of WWII: A changed World!
"At the end of World War II, huge swaths of Europe and Asia had been reduced to ruins. Borders were redrawn and homecomings, expulsions, and burials were under way. But the massive efforts to rebuild had just begun. When the war began in the late 1930s, the world's population was approximately 2 billion. In less than a decade, the war between the Axis the Allied powers had resulted in 80 million deaths -- killing off about 4 percent of the whole world. Allied forces now became occupiers, taking control of Germany, Japan, and much of the territory they had formerly ruled. Efforts were made to permanently dismantle the war-making abilities of those nations, as factories were destroyed and former leadership was removed or prosecuted. War crimes trials took place in Europe and Asia, leading to many executions and prison sentences. Millions of Germans and Japanese were forcibly expelled from territories they called home. Allied occupations and United Nations decisions led to many long-lasting problems in the future, including the tensions that created East and West Germany, and divergent plans on the Korean Peninsula that led to the creation of North and South Korea and -- the Korean War in 1950. The United Nations Partition Plan for Palestine paved the way for Israel to declare its independence in 1948 and marked the start of the continuing Arab-Israeli conflict. The growing tensions between Western powers and the Soviet Eastern Bloc developed into the Cold War, and the development and proliferation of nuclear weapons raised the very real specter of an unimaginable World War III if common ground could not be found. World War II was the biggest story of the 20th Century, and its aftermath continues to affect the world profoundly more than 65 years later."
http://www.theatlantic.com/photo/2011/10/world-war-ii-after-the-war/100180/
“The 1946 Graduates will go out into the world at a time when our Arab Countries are steadily increasing their independence, shaking off foreign yoke and, for the first time in centuries, grasping their fate with their own hands.
To be sure to go steadily on the right path, men of reliable character, ready to assume great responsibilities, are more urgent than men of experience or certain ability. Lack of responsibility is the bane of our life. [...]
It is our task, Graduates of 1946, to develop in ourselves this sense of responsibility, this readiness to see that our duties are fulfilled thoroughly and adequately to the end if we want our countries to keep pace with the development of Western Civilization without our losing Eastern spiritual values."
Editors of Al-Kulliyah Review, student magazine
Al Kulliyah Review, Commencement Number, June 1946, p. 9
If we are to build lands strong enough...
"If we are to build lands strong enough to withstand the shocks of the centuries, we must search for materials far stronger than anything which now exists. We need good homes, in which the youth of the land can be trained for citizenship. We need honest business conducted by merchants, who place the development of their country's resources ahead of personal gain. We need a peasantry intelligent enough to contribute to the national welfare. We need a spirit of team work and a type of patriotism which inspires public service. How important it is that graduates of the University should do their best to help form materials of this sort with which to build! [...]
You men and women are going out into a world that is full of tremendous problems waiting to be solved. There is the United Nations Organization, the greatest opportunity and the most difficult achievement in history. There is a newly gained independence, which may become a menace or a blessing to your national life, depending upon how it is used. There are problems of your own life, still to be built."
Bayard Dodge Baccalaureate Address June 23, 1946, Al Kulliyah Review, Commencement Issue, June 1946
Bayard Dodge Farewell Message to AUB Graduates: "Build as High as Heaven itself!"
"You men and women are leaving your Alma Mater at a time of world crisis. Less than a year ago the greatest war in history came to an end, leaving in its wake far-flung confusion. While half the people of the world are dreaming dreams about freedom and universal peace, the other half are suffering from undernourishment, unemployment and violence.
Even though the political war has ended, there remains the even greater strife against the forces of evil, - against disease, ignorance and exploitation, against corruption and vice. You are not going out into a world of ease and sunshine. You will meet more often with opposition and storm. You will be beset on all sides by discouragements and temptations, by crookedness and unkindness.
If the men and women of your generation are to build something better than their fathers have known, it will be a long, uphill struggle.
It will require courage, unselfishness and endurance. It will demand a heroism no less devoted than the martyrdom of the soldiers at the battle front.
Bayard Dodge Baccalaureate Address June 23, 1946, Al Kulliyah Review, Commencement Issue, June 1946
We send you forth from the University with the affectionate good wishes of your teachers and friends. We send you out to build a new and better world. Build thoroughly and solidiy, using methods as solid as the pyramid. Do not build, as Cheops did, for yourself alone, but also for your fellowmen.
Put not your trust in things material, but fit yourselves as living stones into a building that is spiritual. Build as high as heaven itself"
Bayard Dodge Baccalaureate Address June 23, 1946, Al Kulliyah Review, Commencement Issue, June 1946