President's Letter

We hope you enjoy this special issue of ASU Magazine, which is dedicated to celebrating ASU's 50th anniversary as a university. On Dec. 5, 1958, Gov. Ernest McFarland signed a proclamation announcing the institution's name change from Arizona State College to Arizona State University. This act was preceded by years of academic preparation by Arizona State's faculty and staff, struggles in the state Legislature and at the Arizona Board of Regents and a successful ballot initiative campaign supporting the name change that was waged by thousands of Sun Devil alumni, students and supporters.

The university will be remembering this milestone throughout 2008. The Alumni Association chose to produce a commemorative magazine issue early in the year because our signature event, Founders' Day, held this year on March 18, will also take ASU's 50th anniversary as its theme.

We will honor the alumni classes of 1956 through 1959, who collectively worked so hard to pass the ballot initiative for the name change, with the James W. Creasman Award. We will also be honoring Lt. Gen. Frank Sackton—an alum, a professor emeritus, the founding dean of the College of Public programs, and a distinguished administrator at ASU—as he symbolizes the excellence displayed by alumni who have served ASU as faculty and staff that has characterized the institution since it was chartered in 1885.

The institution that has become Arizona State University has evolved from a normal school to a teacher's college to a leading public research university. We are poised to achieve even greater things in the coming decades; we hope you'll join us as a member of the Alumni Association as ASU becomes the new "gold standard" for higher education in the 21st Century.

Christine K. Wilkinson '66, '76 Ph.D.
President, ASU Alumni Association
Senior Vice President and Secretary of the University