NPS President helps Foundation kick off new alumni program
Today@NPS
NPS President helps Foundation kick off new alumni program
By MC2 Nathan K. Serpico
Nearly 70 Naval Postgraduate School (NPS) alumni from decades past returned to the campus to connect with each other and support the school during the kick-off event of the newly established NPS Alumni Association & Foundation in Herrmann Hall, Feb. 22. The NPS Foundation, founded in 1970, became the NPS Alumni Association & Foundation in January 2019 to engage with NPS alumni from around the world and to better support the school’s strategic goals.
“NPS graduates are leaders and innovators in their fields,” said Rich Patterson, CEO of the NPS Foundation. “The alumni association is the platform that will bring these graduates together and allow them to deepen important personal and professional relationships.”
Patterson began the evening with a query to the attendees about which graduating classes were represented. The query revealed in attendance were alumni as recent as 2018, and from each decade dating back to the 1950s, with an alumnus from 1957 receiving honors as the event’s longest-standing graduate.
Patterson then introduced NPS President retired Vice Adm. Ann Rondeau as the keynote speaker for the event.
“Welcome home,” said Rondeau. “We are delighted to have our alumni here, and you have every reason to be proud of NPS. There is no place on this globe with the kind of research and learning that goes on here.”
Rondeau remarked how the passing of time brings forward a different military and a different set of national security imperatives. Rondeau spoke about specific challenges such as cyber and undersea warfare, and how NPS faculty and students are working very hard overcome these challenges.
In thanking all of the alumni in attendance, Rondeau remarked that the dedication and devotion of alumni to being intelligent and informed patriots is of great value to NPS and big part of the intellectual strength of this country.