Inaugural Address of Dr. William F. Tate IV, 22nd President of Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey

She’s not dead yet. Opportunity lives. She’s not dead yet. Opportunity lives. Not dead yet. Opportunity lives. 

Today, I want to share with you my thoughts on opportunity. I begin by recognizing the favorable actions and deeds that have shaped opportunity for me. I offer my heartfelt gratitude to those who gave life and meaning to today's celebration: to all assembled today, all elected officials, including Lieutenant Governor Way; thank you to the Rutgers Foundation team members, the Board Office team, communications team, Rutgers Police, the President's Office team, my executive leadership team. Thank you for your commitment to excellence.

Rutgers Newark team under the leadership of Chancellor Smith-Jackson and Provost Robinson. Thank you. To Chris Carlin, our Master of Ceremonies; Pastor René Brown; James Williams — James Williams, wow: your inspiring words remind us why we're here today.

I want to thank Chairwoman Amy Towers — she chairs our Board of Governors — for her leadership and consistent encouragement and warm welcome. Lucille Foster, Chair of the University Senate, you are a courageous and empathetic partner in this work. Trustee Ken Johnson, thank you.

To our student government leaders: Adrian Henry, for your wonderful words; Christopher Godoy, Jennifer Levy. Thank you for representing the heart of Rutgers with passion and purpose, and I want to say publicly: thank you for your kindness to me. You forgave me once already. Thank you.

Finally, I offer deep thanks to the Count Basie Orchestra under the direction of Scotty Barnhart and Carmen Bradford for the beautiful national anthem. Each of you have helped to make this day a true reflection of Rutgers spirit: excellence, collaboration, and most importantly, opportunity. You remind us: She’s not dead yet. Opportunity lives.

I am blessed today with the presence of many family members and friends from every season of my life: from high school to my undergraduate years to graduate school, along with colleagues and mentors who helped shape my professional path. I’ll start with a couple of them, off the cuff, as they say. I see right before me Dr. André McKenzie, who spent much of his career at St. John’s University. But prior to that, while I was undergrad, he was our mentoring advisor. His words to me were: “Tate, remember, be humble.” Remember that? Thank you.

You know, the academy is an interesting place. My first real article was done at the University of Wisconsin. Could not have happened, first of all, without my wife — who I’ll talk about in a second — but the other person was Gloria Ladson-Billings, who joins me today. I learned from them how to actually be a scholar.

My first article — the journal — and if you’ve all been through the process, peer review is rough. The journal editor of my first single-authored article as a scholar at the University of Wisconsin joins us today, Dr. Kofi Lomotey. Thank you. You’ve never not supported—you’ve always supported me.

You know, we heard a lot about LSU. They have something called the Lakes there, and you walk the Lakes often. That’s how you get your blood pressure down. Anyone who knows me well knows I had a really good relationship with my father. He’s no longer with us. Whenever it was difficult, that’s who I called.

LSU had six national championships. It was great, but it was difficult. And every time it got difficult, Dr. (Henry) Hank Frierson — I called you. I don’t even think you knew why. You always picked up. You always called back. Thank you. Appreciate you.

I’m blessed to have a wonderful wife, Kimberly Cash Tate. Thank you for your prayers, your steady support. Amazing. She's joined by my son Quentin, my daughter Cameron. I appreciate you all, and I love you.

For more than 40 years, I shared a bond of friendship with a small group. Over that time, I’ve come to deeply love these brothers from Quigley South and Northern Illinois University: Derek Hicks, Miguel Cruz, Sylvester Davis. Dr. James Mendez joins me; and Daryl Tate. And to Daryl and Kevin Tate, who have been there for all but two years of my life — I love you both.

Now, you might ask: Why mention love in a speech about opportunity? Because love says: You matter. Opportunity says: Because you matter, I will make room for you. The door is open for you; I will fight to keep it open for you. 

Love creates opportunity. At the civic level, a just society translates love of neighbor into institutions of opportunity: fair access to education, health, security, and a voice in governance. Opportunity is not a handout; it is a door of partnership, and you must walk through and shake hands with your destiny.

I walked through the door of opportunity and partnership in Louisiana with my colleagues at LSU. Together, as Mr. Williams pointed out, we set all kinds of records in enrollment. We surged in philanthropy, and — as I corrected him — we did win six national championships. I’m honored that several members of the LSU Board of Supervisors are here in support today, including two former chairs of that board: Supervisor Sarpy Jones, Mr. Williams, Supervisor Morris, Mr. Collis Temple. This is a distinguished group, and I’m thankful for them. I want to publicly say: this group entrusted me with my first presidency—in the Deep South, the southernmost place in America. Thank you.

To the Rutgers Board of Governors and Trustees, I offer my sincere thanks for opening the door of leadership at this outstanding institution. Please allow me just a few moments for additional thanks.

The seniormost member of my side of the family is present today. Present today is my aunt and uncle, Mr. and Mrs. Byron Legardy. I remember your wedding like it was yesterday. As a boy, I cried. I thought my aunt was leaving me. My beloved mother assured me that that was not the case. I had no idea what it would turn into decades later: a formidable support system, a steady stream of encouragement and love, and of course your two beautiful children, Jennifer and Nathan.

My wife’s side of the family — New Jersey’s own Brenda Terrell — shines as a true example of family. She and her late husband, Leverne, spearheaded an annual family reunion in North Carolina every year in August. My wife invited me to attend back in the late 1980s, and I’ve been a regular ever since. New generations now carry that tradition forward. Watching them grow and recommit to learning and education as a family value year after year has shaped my own mindset, reminding me to push for opportunity through more than three decades in the academy. I don’t think you understand what that event meant for me every year. Every year I was reminded; every year I could go back to this thing called the university, this medieval environment, and fight for opportunity. Thank you.

The study of opportunity has been a bedrock of my academic research journey. [Presses remote clicker.] You know, it’s not academic talk if you don’t have some kind of symbol system. (You know, all my professor friends are going to judge me on this. This is where they’re going to say, “Hey, that was a good talk.” I know how this works. I’m not even going to look at it.)

Here’s the deal: we’re all born somewhere. We live in a community. In those communities, they have schools, and they work together. When it’s working really well, your pre-K through high school and all the informal processes have a foundational track. Everybody in those places ends up in some kind of post-secondary education. Once they make it into post-secondary education, they graduate. (And by the way, it’s better to flunk out of school than not go to college. The data’s clear; empirical reality. But don’t flunk out.) It gets you new social capital. You move into the workforce. You add value to your community because you can pay taxes, you support your family, you engage civically. It’s quite powerful. And then you go back to a community that looks just like the zip code that you started in. It’s intractable. It happens over and over again.

Unfortunately, if you're born in a community where the schools are not as strong — in fact, the realtors will tell you, because they'll say, “Don't move in that neighborhood.” They’re real clear about it. In fact, if you want to know if it's a good community and good schools, you just ask a realtor. They all know by zip code.

If it doesn't go very well, the likelihood that you end up in post-secondary education is very small. And in fact, there's a high probability you could drop out. And if you end up dropping out, unfortunately it costs society a lot of money. Sometimes you end up in jail. You certainly don't make as much money as you would if you had matriculated in post-secondary school. So thus, it's a negative on tax support. And oftentimes, these people are not engaged civically. And just like the other track, they end up back in the zip code like the one they started in — if they ever left. And that happens over and over and over again. That’s called the United States of America.

I want to make this personal for you today, if I can. Do you mind? Because, for me, it all started on a baseball field.

It's where I actually learned that theory. It wasn't in the sociology class — it was in real life. A baseball field. Madden Park, Chicago, Illinois, 38th Street. If you're from Chicago, you know you know. Tough place. At the time, 1973, there was a program called Model Cities. It was designed to deal with poverty in the United States of America. We don’t do that kind of thing anymore. But back then there was a War on Poverty. It started for me in this park because they decided that they wanted — and the person who decided was actually the mayor of the City of Chicago — that he wanted to have a city-wide competition.

So, we were called from our Little League teams to show up at that park. Scores and scores of young people showed up to try out for 12 spots on the team that would represent the Robert Taylor Homes. [mic drops out temporarily.] Stateway Gardens — You know Stateway Gardens? You social scientists for sure know — Stateway Gardens. Ivy Wells housing project. And where I lived, Lawless Gardens. These are actual pictures from 1973. That’s what it looked like.

That’s how it played out. Well, as it happened, I had a good day. In fact, I had a good couple of days, because the tryout lasted multiple days. I didn't drop a ball. I hit the ball to right field from the right side. So he’s like, “This guy can hit the ball anywhere.” Lo and behold, on the last day my name — we made the cut. And we entered Mayor Daley’s tournament.

Now, you need to understand this man. You need to understand — we got no uniforms. Played in your blue jeans and Converse All Stars, if you had Converse All Stars. Some folks had Jeepers. That was real bad — if you wore Jeepers. Talked about you like a dog. Had on a sweatshirt. Baseball cap. None of them matched. And you show up at Washington Park in Chicago, and you play game after game after game.

Now Mayor Daley, in his infinite wisdom, said it’s a one-and-done tournament. The moment you lose, it’s over. We won. And we won. And we won. And we won. And we kept winning. So all of a sudden, we’re out of the Washington Park bracket, and they say, “You’ve got to go over to the Southeast Side,” which wasn’t very pleasant for those of us who came from this neighborhood. But we went over there — and we won. And we won.

Then they said, “You have to go to the Southwest Side.” Now, those of you who know Chicago know that means I'm talking about west of State Street and the Dan Ryan. They call that Canaryville and Bridgeport and places like that. Just read a few books about it; I won’t have time today to tell you what that really meant. But we went over there — and we won. And we won. And we won the South Side Little League Championship, which means we had to play the West Side team, the North Side team, the East Side team — had to all come together, that’s the semifinals.

This stuff is getting serious. And we’re still wearing this ragtag gear. We play the team from the North Side and beat them like thieves. Now this is what happened: we ended up playing at White Sox Park and Wrigley Field. And you know what happened before we got to White Sox Park and Wrigley Field? Somehow the mayor’s office found out — and we got uniforms. Isn’t that something? And new gloves and cleats. No more playing in Converse All Stars in dirt. It was quite special. Even matching hats. That’s a picture of us with the boss in the Chicago Defender. It says it was a record game. Little League is six innings; the game went twelve innings. You see all the smiles on those boys’ faces. They say we took the picture after the game. Well, I know that’s a lie — because we lost that game. We took those pictures before the game.

Now, if you think this is really about baseball — it's not. It’s really one glimpse of what I want you to understand about William F. Tate. And you always hear me talking about what? Winning. Because when I was a boy, if you didn’t win, you didn’t get nothing. That’s who I am. I can’t change. So when you hear me talking about winning, you understand today from this speech why it mattered. All those kids on that (team).

Some years later, that Model Cities program was still going on. I was in fifth grade at that time. By the time I got to ninth grade, Model Cities was still happening. It was winding down, though — late ’70s. I ended up in jobs with some of those kids that I played ball with. I didn’t like any of them, by the way. We didn’t like each other. I’m just telling you how it was. We just wanted to win. I respected them. I didn’t like ‘em. You’ll also find out about me when you work with me: I might not like you, but if you get it done, I’m gonna fight for you. That’s how I am.

But I met those kids later, and I realized something radically different had changed. There was a big difference between Lawless Gardens and Stateway Gardens. Opportunity structures just were very, very, very different. Painfully so.

I had this school — Holy Angels — largest Black Catholic school in the United States of America. An unbelievable intellectual experience. I tell people all the time: I'm not sure I learned much after that, other than technical information. It was unreal.

This is a picture. And the picture tells the story of the difference in my life and those guys I played ball with. The gentlemen in the cap and gowns — that was the class that graduated after me in Holy Angels. They were one class removed from my class. The gentlemen wearing the black outfits or the darker outfits, sweatshirts — that was my class. They came back to graduation in Holy Angels. They all have St. Lawrence on there. See that’s a rectory. That’s Father George Clements. If you know history, you know who Father George Clements is. If you don’t know, you need to know.

The fact that those men from the prior class came back — at an elementary school, a K-12 school — to welcome the graduates from the next class tells you everything about the mindset that was cultivated in that environment. It’s very different than a regular school. People always talk about “Was it a good school?” Now, that’s a good school.

All those men that have St. Lawrence on their jerseys? That priest, that pastor, that school, set them up to attend school outside of Chicago — boarding school. All those men — the ones still living — had reasonably good lives based on the opportunity cycle. There was an intervention that was deep and rich.

I learned in my own life. That same man showed up at my school when I was a junior in high school. I had no idea what he was doing there. I said, “What are you doing here?” He said, “I was just taking care of business.” In my adult life, we meet again. He says, “I was coming to check on how you were doing, and I wanted to understand what your experience was like and whether we had adequately prepared you so we could go back to our school and create an articulation arrangement so that any young person can come to that school and be successful.” That’s where the education is. That’s how you do it.

How many kids get that today? And that opportunity structure I’m talking about — it's by zip code.

Enter Rutgers.

What a place. South Jersey. Camden.

I wasn’t going to do this, but since James kind of gave me approval: that institution is the 46th-ranked public university in the United States of America. Fifth best for social mobility. Fifth best in the United States of America for social mobility. Fifth best.

I’m going to say something to you because you need to understand who I am. Since taking this job, I’ve had people say to me — Chancellor Tillis might not believe this – I’ve had people say to me: “Don’t invest in Camden.”

I don’t think they know who they’re talking to. Did you see those pictures of those boys I played baseball with? Do you think I have forgotten who I am?

Let me be clear with you today. Not only are they fifth best, you’re going to be top-40 in the United States of America. There is a Big Ten law school in Camden. A Big Ten law school. I am a child of the Big Ten, born in the cradle of it. I understand it better than you folks out east. I’m sorry, but I do. There is a Big Ten law school in Camden.

If that school — Camden — was in the SEC, it would be ranked higher than every single school in the SEC, absent those in the AAU. How dare you come to me and say we’re going to forget about Camden. Don’t play with me.

We’re going to build that Big Ten brand in Camden. Look out Philadelphia — we’re coming — for opportunity. It’s not a competition like that baseball game; it’s about opening the door. That’s what we’re going to do.

Newark.

Number nine in the country — in the United States of America — for social mobility. Number nine — opening the doors. Thirty-sixth-ranked public university in America.

Chancellor, I think you can be 30.

I think you can be an R1, Chancellor.

This child of the Big Ten says this to you: What cities in the United States have a Big Ten business school, a Big Ten law school, and a Big Ten medical school? Newark!

You just have to lean in. So today, today, in this speech, I give Newark permission to lean in to the Big Ten brand. Lean in. It’s yours.

I know y’all like to talk about anchor institutions, don’t you? I hear that a lot in Newark. Anchor yourself in the Big Ten. Oh, I know you don’t like it — but you will when we get done.

New Brunswick.

Member of the AAU. Big Ten athletic conference. Top-16 public in the United States. Middlesex County — I see you, Gary (Taffet). My Middlesex folks, that’s a wonderful governor. Middlesex — I’m going to say this to you, and I mean it: the top four biomedical hubs in the United States — San Fran, Boston, DMV, and then they say New Jersey. That’s what they tell me.

I want Middlesex to pass the DMV.

That means: Rutgers University, 16 is not good enough. We need to be a Top-10 public university. We can lean into our research.

It is right now the second-highest-ranked Big Ten school for social mobility. We need to be number one.

They play sports in the Big Ten. We have a new athletic director. Keli Zinn — I know she’s here.

We’re going to R-NIL our way to winning. Y’all know what R-NIL is? Rutgers NIL. You see, when I played baseball, they didn’t give you any money. And remember, I didn’t even have any jerseys. Today, it’s a little bit different. You win if you pay. You don’t want to embrace that? I thought Jersey was tougher than that.

We’re going to do it. We’re going to win. This is an interesting slide — this thing called Rutgers Health. I want to make something very clear today as we go along. It says 2.3 million patient visits, and — it’s (written) really small — it says RWJ Barnabas Health and University Hospital on there.

When we have a medical school, but we need a clinical partner, I’m committed to working with that clinical partner, with Rutgers Health. We’re going to be world class — 100% — in everything we do: our cancer center, the whole enterprise. That’s how we’re going to move Middlesex forward. I’m excited to work in that partnership because I know people need good health.

Now, we do a lot of great things at Rutgers. Seventy-one thousand students. Almost a billion dollars in research. All our campuses are in the top 50. Great technology transfer. Great industry partnerships. Big Ten roots. Big city reach. We have a lot of opportunity.

But I’m going to say this to you: opportunity is lost without focus.

In the age of perpetual commentary and curated outrage, the call from First Thessalonians 4:11 sounds almost subversive: “Make it your ambition to lead a quiet life, mind your own business, and work with your hands.”

At first glance, this counsel from Paul may seem out of step with the visibility expected of university leaders. Yet, for a community like Rutgers — born of conviction, service, and scholarship — his words align perfectly with our founding vision and motto: “Sun of Righteousness, shine upon the West.”

Quietness, in the Pauline sense, is not silence. It is steadiness. It means being anchored in a conviction, not reacting to every passing storm. For the Rutgers leader, this quietness reflects the composure of a mind illuminated by knowledge and the courage of heart guided by purpose.

The Sun of Righteousness calls us not to hide from the world’s noise, but to bring light and clarity to it.

To mind your own business is to steward our shared calling. Paul’s phrase is not isolationist. It is a call to focus. To mind our work is to stay centered on our mission: advancing learning, discovery, and opportunity, without distraction or distortion.

To work with your hands reflects our tradition of engaged excellence. Paul’s exhortation dignifies labor of every kind, reminding us that intellectual and practical work are equally sacred. We win together.

Paul concludes that such a life wins the respect of outsiders.

In an era defined by speed, spectacle, and performative acts, we have a moment to demonstrate our commitments to opportunity. It exists in every zip code and income bracket in New Jersey. It is limited only by our collective focus and imagination.

When it comes to students, excellence can be found everywhere. Finding it and letting it flourish drives our state, our university, our communities forward. We must commit to investing in opportunity.

Now, if you thought I was having a speech and not going to ask you for money, you’re very much mistaken.

We have three scholarship programs. One of them I learned about while I was president of LSU. We were searching the literature for a program that would help us reach into communities near Baton Rouge and pull out the most talented young people who heretofore had never applied to LSU. They had every single criterion you would want in a student — except, just like those young people that I showed you in my baseball team — they didn’t have the people to come pull them out.

Well, our search led us to Rutgers. Stunningly, the Rutgers Future Scholars Program was replicated at LSU.

Well, it serves over 215 first-generation, low-income, academically talented middle school students in New Brunswick, Piscataway, Camden, (Rahway), and here in Newark — the opportunity to begin their journey toward a college education. It’s stunningly powerful. If you’ve never visited it, please do.

We also have the Scarlet Promise Initiative. This is an empowering program to take talented young people and give them financial and academic support toward a degree so they can manage it without the great debt that’s associated with higher education.

And today, I want to formally announce a third fund.

You know, I’ve been talking a lot about the Rutgers Edge. Well, we’re announcing the Edge Fund — not the hedge fund — the Edge Fund. 

It is created for students whose brilliance crosses categories: artists, scientists, coders, writers, competitors in non-revenue sports. Some of you think everybody’s on a scholarship because they have Rutgers across their chest and they play sports; most of those kids don’t. We need to support them. They have a genius. All of these kids that we need to support — these are the future inductees to the New Jersey Hall of Fame.

We need to celebrate these thinkers. We need to honor them. We need to have an opportunity created for them. The scholarships are there for people who see possibility where others see limit.

Opportunity lives in our spirit of generosity. Rutgers gives life to opportunity to so many lives.

We must avoid an NJ.com obituary of this type: 

Today we mourn the death of an old friend, Rutgers University, the State University of New Jersey, who lived among us for many centuries. She was born in 1766, parented by the Dutch Reformed Church and originally known as Queen’s College. She later pledged herself to Colonel Henry Rutgers, adopting his name and character, steadfast, civic-minded, and faithful to pursue knowledge.

She made many invaluable contributions: a system of academic institutions, research and discovery, economic development, health care, agriculture extension across the state, the first collegiate football game, a legacy of teachers, doctors, lawyers, social workers, engineers, business leaders, nonprofit innovators, artists, and creative minds across disciplines. Rutgers lived by complex but honorable financial principles, spending only what she could generate or responsibly borrow, and she maintained a proud tradition of faculty and staff governance.

Her health began to deteriorate when she lost sight of her core values: passion and discovery, truth seeking, empathy, and courage. Reports began to circulate of well-intended leaders closing humanities and fine arts departments, wrongly arguing that they lacked economic value. Empathy waned, revealed in declining philanthropic support and a lack of will to organize around a true cycle of opportunity agenda. The university's failure to reflect the state's changing demographics only deepened her fragility. Her inability to embrace her Big Ten identity finally crushed her in the marketplace.

Rutgers lost ground when leaders advanced pet projects that lacked synergy, interdependence, and strategic purpose, projects that failed to translate discovery from molecules to markets. She could not sustain her academic medical center or her health care partnerships.

Self-interest reigned, and the University took a public beating when she could no longer defend her actions in this very newspaper.

She surrendered her will to live when former students, unprepared for the demands of human connection, revolted, deprived of humanistic and STEM preparation, they found themselves unable to think critically, read deeply, or collaborate to solve problems. In protest, thousands shouted, “You betrayed the line in the alma mater, ‘Learnings fair and honor shine on the banks of the old Raritan.’”

She was preceded in death by her parents, Teaching and Learning; by her husband, Discovery; by her daughter, Truth; by her son, Academic Freedom; by her sister, University Hospital; by her brother, Rutgers Cancer Institute; by her niece, Fairness, also called Equality; by her nephew, Merit, and his child, Peer Review.

She is survived by six stepbrothers: X, formerly known as Twitter; generative AI; micro credential; fake news; pseudoscience; and ahistorical thinking.

No one attended her funeral. Camden, New Brunswick and Newark had become ghost towns after the Covid-25 pandemics. And the rest of the state dismissed the obituary as fake news planted by a Seton Hall operative. 

Hallelujah, she’s not dead yet. Opportunity lives. 

Thank you.