President's Letter

As George Mason University enters its 27th year, we have much of which we can and should be proud, as a university and as alumni.

It seems like yesterday this very full and exciting year began. In November, we approved charters for the DC Metro and Richmond Chapters. The Broadside and Forensics groups also achieved full chapter status in the Alumni Association. In February, we had a wonderful, well-attended Homecoming Block Party followed by the final home game of our Colonial Athletic Association-champion Patriots basketball team. We celebrated the opening of the new building on the Arlington campus on the March Founder's Day event at the School of Law, and in April, we held the Alumni Association's annual Celebration of Distinction at which we honored many members of the George Mason community.

As you receive this issue of the Mason Spirit, many of us will be enjoying fellowship and fun at the Gold Cup Races. And, we are looking forward to May 16 at Gunston Hall, where we will welcome the new alumni from the class of 1999 and the reunion classes of 1969, 1979, and 1989. I hope to see many of you at this event.

As we go to press, the search for a new director of the Alumni Affairs Office is in full swing with the hope that she or he will have been named by the time you read this. Similarly, I am pleased to report that Judith Jobbitt has accepted the position of vice president for University Development and president of the GMU Foundation, to whom Alumni Affairs reports. Many members of the Alumni Association Board of Directors were actively involved in both of these searches.

In closing this, my last letter to you, I acknowledge and thank the short-handed staff of our Alumni Affairs Office for its wonderful performance this year. I also thank the many alumni who have volunteered and participated in our work and events this year. Nothing we do happens without your support and involvement, and I very much appreciate it.

Lester P. Schoene, Jr.
M.S. Conflict Resolution '92