Our veteran students, faculty, staff, alumni and family members are vital contributors to our community and we are proud to recognize them at our annual Veterans Day Ceremony on Friday, November 11. I invite you to join us at the Medal of Honor Memorial on the Seattle campus and to participate in Veterans Appreciation Week events across our three campuses.
Category: Veterans
Honoring veterans next week and every day
Next week, we commemorate Veterans Day and our three campuses will offer a variety of opportunities to honor those who have served in our nation’s armed forces. As a community, let’s show our appreciation for their courage and commitment by making sure that every veteran’s Husky Experience is welcoming and enriching.
A chance to reflect and honor those who gave their lives
Memorial Day is intended as a day for reflection and as we honor those who made the ultimate sacrifice, I am reminded of what those who serve in the military can teach us about how to not only survive, but thrive, through this pandemic.
Come together to honor – and support – our veterans
The University of Washington is proud to honor all veterans, especially the students, faculty, staff, alumni and parents who are part of our UW family. Throughout the week leading up to our annual Veteran’s Day Ceremony, we are hosting events to celebrate our veterans and help our community better understand how to support our friends and colleagues who have served.
Join in honoring the UW’s veterans
At the University of Washington, Veterans’ Appreciation is a special time in which we pause to acknowledge the courage and sacrifice of our veterans and all who have served, both in our community and across our nation. To recognize their service, I invite you to take part in some of the Veterans Appreciation events, November 6-11, across our three campuses.
To honor those we’ve lost, support those who are with us
Memorial Day is not about celebrating war, but about celebrating the lives of men and women like Will, who put everything on the line so that others might live a better life, across the world and at home. It offers a moment for all of us to unite in honoring them, and, just as important, supporting the family, friends and fellow veterans who grieve their loss.
Honoring UW veterans
This month, the University of Washington is hosting a series of events on all three of our campuses to honor the many UW students, alumni, faculty, staff and retirees who have valiantly served in the U.S. Armed Forces.
The Veterans Day holiday, November 11, is the day our country and our University officially pause to recognize the sacrifices and contributions of veterans. At 11 a.m. that day, at the Medal of Honor Memorial, the UW will honor all veterans and present the 2015 Distinguished Alumni Veteran Award to Retired Army Col. Grethe Cammermeyer, ’76, ’91.
Beyond the ceremony, the UW strives to support our veterans year-round. Across our campuses, there are more than 30 programs for our 1,400 student veterans, active-duty military service members and their dependents, including:
- UW Tacoma’s Veterans Incubator for Better Entrepreneurship program, which empowers veterans to pursue their own businesses.
- The UW Bothell Student-Veterans Association, a student-run organization that serves as a peer resource for students as they make the transition from a military environment to an academic one.
- A new Office of Student Veteran Life, scheduled to open at our Seattle campus in December. It will provide students with access to counselors, career guidance and mentors.
You can find additional program information and links to related articles on the Veterans Appreciation Week website.
Please join me in extending our deepest gratitude to all UW veterans for their service, and thank you to all in the UW community who support them.
Celebrating Veterans Day with Richard Layton, the UW’s 2014 Distinguished Alumni Veteran
Each year, the University of Washington presents one graduate with the Distinguished Alumni Veteran Award, commending graduates who have made a positive impact through community service and civic engagement. This year’s recipient has dedicated his life to service — first through the military and later as a physician for the underserved and an educator in the medical field.
Richard Layton, M.D., ’54, ’58, was drafted into the U.S. Navy at age 18. With the nation still in the clutches of World War II, Dr. Layton soon found himself at Bikini Atoll in the Marshall Islands, where atomic bombs were tested. After bombs were detonated, he was sent to assess the bombed-out ships — a job that exposed him to critically dangerous levels of radiation.
Returning to the United States in 1946, Dr. Layton started a new chapter at the University of Washington as a medical student, where he graduated at the top of his class. As a physician and an educator, Dr. Layton has impacted countless lives during the course of his career. He was one of the pioneering physicians in the University of Washington School of Medicine’s WWAMI program, which trains UW physicians in five states with a focus on rural and underserved areas.
Dr. Layton practiced for 19 years in Grandview, Washington, before becoming director of the family medicine residency program at Providence Hospital for the UW, a position he filled for 20 years. Over the course of his career — during which he worked tirelessly on behalf of his patients and for regional and national medical organizations — Dr. Layton earned many prestigious honors. In 1986, he was Washington state’s family physician of the year.
Upon his retirement, he earned emeritus faculty status with the UW School of Medicine for his many years as a clinical professor. More recently, Dr. Layton received the alumni service award from the UW School of Medicine. And last year, Gov. Jay Inslee bestowed the Washington State Governor’s Recognition Award on Dr. Layton for his “selflessness and lifelong commitment to service.” In the spirit of continuing that service, the University’s physician assistant program selects a graduate each year to receive the Richard H. Layton Award for Commitment to Underserved Populations.
Congratulations to Dr. Layton, and thank you to all UW servicemen and servicewomen for your commitment to our country and our community.
Saluting our servicemen and servicewomen
At the University of Washington, we strive to remember our veterans not just during Veterans Appreciation Week, but year-round. Across our campuses, monuments honoring those who have served greet us: the Medal of Honor Memorial; the 58 sycamore trees lining Memorial Way, reminding us of the UW students and faculty who lost their lives during World War I in service to our country; and the central flagpole bearing the names of students, faculty and staff who never returned to the UW from the battlefields of World War II.
These tangible symbols remind us of the intangible values our United States veterans have worked — and valiantly fought — to uphold. Values including freedom, peace, opportunity and justice. They help us reflect on the meaning of courage, selflessness and determination.
But we know that monuments and our words of gratitude alone are not enough. Across the University, we are working to strengthen and expand programs to better support our veterans as they embark on the next phase of their journey.
There are more than 40 programs for veterans, active-duty military and their dependents across the UW’s three campuses.For instance, at UW Tacoma — which Victory Media designated as a military-friendly school for the fourth year in a row — the Veterans Incubator for Better Entrepreneurship program, or VIBE, is engaging veterans with entrepreneurial talent. The program recognizes veterans’ unique leadership and problem-solving skills and empowers them to pursue their own businesses.
Also at UW Tacoma, we’re responding to the growing demand from the public and private sectors for professionals who can deal with cyber threats. This year, the Milgard School of Business partnered with the UW Tacoma Institute of Technology to launch a new master’s degree in cybersecurity and leadership. It was developed as a direct response to the needs of the military community — and our nation.
At UW Bothell, a recently developed course is successfully helping veterans navigate the transition from military life to academic life.And the UW School of Law is working with the Northwest Justice Project to start a veterans law clinic to address legal needs in areas of veteran’s administration and mental health, housing, consumer issues and family law.
As students and teachers, faculty and staff, neighbors and friends, we are all enriched by our veteran and military community. And so it is of vital importance that we support veterans through research that will positively impact people’s lives and help us create a world of good. To give just one example, through projects funded by the National Institutes of Health, the UW School of Nursing is contributing to pain management research at Madigan Army Hospital at Joint Base Lewis-McChord.
Various UW organizations, including researchers in the UW School of Public Health, have created PEARLS, a national evidence-based treatment program for depression. While the program has focused primarily on senior populations, it is now expanding to treat older veterans in King County as well.
Through all of these collective efforts, we are proud to be ranked No. 2 in the nation in U.S. News & World Report’s listing of the Best Colleges for Veterans.
Yet, we are not complacent. We will continue to do more to support our veterans, active-military service members and their families through research as well as educational and employment opportunities. On behalf of the entire University, thank you to all Husky veterans for your service, leadership and commitment to our country and our communities.