President's Message
 The
idea of an American style graduate university in Armenia was developed
at one of the bleakest moments of the history of Armenia, following
the 1988 earthquake that resulted in an unprecedented level of
destruction and casualties in recent memory. However, with the
establishment of this University a moment of adversity was turned
by its founders into positive achievement. The small group of people
that planned AUA were agents of change who were able to see the
historical opportunity to affect the lives of a large number of
people.
The establishment and development of a University,
outside the United States, based on the American model, was not
an accident.
The American higher educational system provides an approach that
can help train the type of expertise Armenia and the region need
to make the appropriate economic and social-developmental transitions
at the start of the new millennium.
As primarily a graduate university,
AUA is involved not only in imparting knowledge but also in developing
actively new knowledge
through research. The university is a direct participant in
the sustainable long-term development of Armenia and its regions.
Our
Research Centers provide a venue through which students and
faculty
participate in that development.
The University provides an
environment that encourages academic excellence, freedom of inquiry,
personal integrity, and a concern
for societal issues. As the educational programs evolve over
the next few years, we hope to achieve more multi-disciplinary
integration
that helps develop the person beyond narrow technical expertise.
The students at AUA have a personal responsibility
for their education. During their education, students have the
opportunity
to develop
critical thinking and analytic reasoning as well as problem
solving skills. These are some of the challenges that the
new students
have to face at AUA. This catalog is a window that the
University opens on itself for those interested in the institution.
It provides information about the programs, philosophy,
people,
and various
rules that the University has established. However, we
have to be aware that the University is a very active and dynamic
system.
There is a constant and lively pace of change at the American
University of Armenia and what is presented in this catalog
provides only
a snapshot about the University at a fixed point in time.
The
AUA website at http://www.aua.am is yet
another source that, we hope, will continuously provide
the
most recent and up-to-date information about the University.
This
is a higher educational institution that has been evolving at
a number of levels. The challenges that the
founders of
AUA set forth for AUA will continue to be met on a daily
basis by
its faculty, staff, students, and alumni.
HAROUTUNE K. ARMENIAN
President of the American University of Armenia
Haroutune Armenian, M.D., Dr. P.H. is the President of the American
University of Armenia, and the Dean of the College of Health
Sciences. He is a Professor of Epidemiology at the Johns Hopkins
University Bloomberg School of Public Health. He has served as
the Dean of the Faculty of Health Sciences at the American University
of Beirut and has been the manager of a number of health manpower
and health services development projects in numerous countries.
His research focuses on chronic disease epidemiology, disaster
and historical epidemiology using Armenian parish records.
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