Speech at the Foundation Stone Laying Ceremony
October 26, 2019
By Vincent Chang
Sir Abed. Lady Abed, Chairperson & Members of the Board, Colleagues, Students, Alumni, Guests, and Friends.
A day of milestone today. Today is a day of milestone, literally and figuratively.
Literally, the foundation stone will be laid. This marks the beginning of the end of the new campus construction. This new campus, when it’s completed, will be an iconic addition to the city. We plan to start our classes here, on this new campus, in summer 2021.
Figuratively, today’s event also marks the beginning of a renewed Brac University, or BracU 2.0, with renewed vision and mission. The renewed Brac University will embrace the two most important pillars of a university -- creating knowledge and upholding human values. BracU 2.0 will also take on today’s toughest challenges facing our generations -- sustainable growth. We intend to become a major player in the global higher education.
Both literal and figurative milestones converge to a single individual, Sir Abed. It is his vision that gives birth to this university. It is his commitment that leads to this new campus and the renewed university
In the past several months, I have been to quite a few international conferences on higher education. I have always been the only one from a Bangladesh university. In those conferences, I would often start my Bangladesh experience by telling Sir Abed’s stories of his 47-year journey that has touched, helped, transformed the lives of 135 million people.
Then, I continued by quoting Sir Abed’s remarks of earlier this year:
“What do we do on the day we’re ranked #1 NGO in the world?
We start the day like every other day.
Teachers open doors for millions of children around the world
Health worker provide services to people in every corner of cities and villages…
We build hope and self-confidence.
We wake up every morning like we have for the last 47 years with the same enthusiasm,
the same commitment and the same belief.”
So, it is 47 years and it keeps going. It is 135 million and it keeps adding. What Sir Abed has done is of highest humanity. It is the opinions of myself, and of the conference audience, that what he has done is of Nobel caliber, in either peace or economics or perhaps both.
My story about Sir Abed did not stop here. I would continue. Why? Because we got a university. This university.
We know that no institutions last forever. But universities last longer than any others.
It is Sir Abed’s intent to make Brac University, this university, to last more than 47 years, to hundreds or thousands of years.
So far, I have referred to this university going forward as Brac University 2.0. But to me, and I believe perhaps to all of you, Sir Abed is bigger than Brac. So, in my heart, this university is a Sir Abed’s University, a de facto Abed University.
Thank you, Sir Abed, for being an extraordinary human being and a giant of humanity. And thank you for giving us a university. Now it is our job to make sure it lasts for hundreds or thousands of years.
Let us mark today as a milestone of this Abed’s university. Let us mark today as the first year for the next thousand years of Abed’s legacy.
Thank you.