Thank You, Mark.

I’ve had a wide range of emotions and thoughts about yesterday's news that President Huddleston is retiring at the end of the next academic year: sadness (for me and UNH), happiness (for him) - but mostly gratitude. I’ve had the pleasure and honor of working with Mark for the past seven years. There are many traits I’ve come to admire and appreciate about him: keeping the focus on the vision amidst a lot of noise and distractions; a calm demeanor in the face of challenges; and a core set of guiding values - among many. But the more I thought about my time with Mark and the past seven years I realized that what I admire and appreciate the most has been his deep passion and commitment to UNH’s public land-grant mission to not only educate NH’s best and brightest but to make sure UNH is doing all it can to make NH the best state we can for its residents. As a native son of NH, and a proud UNH alum, I have a strong, in-my-blood affection for the Granite State and UNH. (The license plate on the family car is UNH-603). In 2011, at the height of the great recession, NH was facing a large budget deficit and UNH’s state funding was cut by 49% - the largest single year cut in the history of public higher education in the country. None of UNH’s options were great on how to handle this sharp cut in funding. However, Mark made it clear from the beginning that we would do three things: 1) minimize tuition increases for students 2) protect academic quality and 3) protect entities like Cooperative Extension that provide vital services, programming and research for NH residents. We weathered the storm and thanks to his leadership and focus, we accomplished all three things.

Thank you, Mark. Thank you for all you have done for the past 10 years to strengthen UNH and New Hampshire. I look forward to the next year.