Jenni, BBA ' 92, & Dan Hord III, BBA '89, Regent

As the parent of two sons — Hunt and Davis — who are Baylor pre-business majors right now, the foundational pillar of a transformative undergraduate education is particularly meaningful.

The people speaking into their lives and shaping who they are, and the mission behind that, matters — and not just to my two sons, but to the more than 17,000 students enrolled at the University.

Baylor is filled with leaders — professors who integrate their faith into the classroom, and administrators and staff who do the same in their own spaces. When you think of the size of Baylor’s ambitions, it is impossible not to focus on our undergraduate program, and the way that the young men and women who come here will be shaped by those leaders. As Baylor builds on the four foundational pillars of Illuminate, the undergraduate piece is vital.

My wife Jenni, BBA ’92, and I were excited about handing our sons off to Baylor, because we know what makes Baylor different. Professors here are teaching more than finance or geology. They are helping students see the broader mission behind it. They are speaking into the lives of our sons and all their students in ways that impact how they live, how they treat others and who they will go out into the world and be.

“Professors here are teaching more than finance or geology. They are helping students see the broader mission behind it.”

I think students take for granted how many great minds and great people there are on campus because it is so easy to bump into someone who has integrated his or her faith into what they teach and the way they live their lives. Students see that, are shaped by it and go out to replicate it. That’s what is different about Baylor, and that’s why it is transformative.

When you think of the undergraduate students who come here, some will pursue careers after graduation and others will go on to earn graduate degrees. However, all of them will go out into the world shaped by their experiences here as members of the Baylor Family.

That is why we focus on transformational undergraduate education, and we will keep it in the forefront. It’s why we continue to focus on, fund and recruit the best professors. It’s why we provide our students with the best classrooms and campus-life opportunities to support that focus.

As parents, we are fortunate if we have our children in our homes from the time they are infants, to elementary and junior high, and to high school. Then, we hand them off as they truly begin to enter adulthood. We know the people speaking into their lives while they are in our homes. At Baylor, we seek to be sure our faculty, staff and administrators continue to speak into and pour into our students’ minds and souls.

Students probably are unaware that they’re being transformed during this moment in their lives, but they will recognize it down the road.

Transformational undergraduate education — that’s what they receive here every day, and no place does it like Baylor.