President Hsu Reflects on the College's Tradition of Firsts
In this message to CofC faculty and staff, President Hsu reflects on some of the College's historic firsts, celebrates some of its recent ones and looks forward to many more to come.
Dear Faculty and Staff,
This winter, I have been dipping in and out of J.H. Easterby’s 1936 A History of the College of Charleston. It is an incredible resource for understanding the first 150 years of our institution. As you can imagine, there are a lot of firsts within that timeframe: first graduating class (1794); first permanent academic building, Randolph Hall (1828); and first female graduate (1922).
But we are not done with celebrating firsts on this campus. Far from it.
Earlier in January, we announced our first named school: the Michael and Amy Bennett School of Hospitality and Tourism Management within the School of Business.
This historic milestone is thanks to Michael Bennett, whose image graces the cover of the winter issue of College of Charleston Magazine, and his family. Mike is the founder of Bennett Hospitality, headquartered here in Charleston, and he and his family have deep ties to the College. He started here in 1977 as a student, working within our Facilities Management team; and his wife, Amy ’82, and son, Jack ’16, are both graduates.
The Bennett family’s transformative gift provides long-term stability, elevates the College’s national profile, strengthens academic focus and connects one of our strongest academic programs with one of the most respected names in hospitality.
Another transformative gift, announced last fall, came from Beemok, Ben and Kelly Navarro’s family office, and will allow the College to acquire the Carroll Building (on the corner of East Bay and North Market streets) and develop the site for a new and expanded School of Business building. This is a once-in-a-century opportunity to extend the footprint of our campus and more fully integrate our university within the city of Charleston, especially its business district and the future Union Pier development.
My hope is that these two extraordinary investments in the College of Charleston are but the first of many to come in the next few years to strengthen our programs and advance our academic mission.
And, as students of our institution’s history, we know yesterday’s firsts built this university, and today’s firsts will shape what it will be for the next centuries.
Sincerely,
Andrew
Andrew T. Hsu
President
College of Charleston
