Though it arrived without any of the fanfare of the new millennium, 2001 was anything but an ordinary year at Tufts.

Medford/Somerville, Mass. [01.03.02] - While the new year has already arrived, there is still time to give 2001 a final, parting glance. Distinguished by a host of major events -- some tragic, many others inspiring -- the past year at Tufts was marked by new faces, important discoveries and significant progress. And as the last year proved, it's easy to pack a lot of major events into twelve months, even if they seem to pass very quickly.

   Since the start of 2001, Tufts welcomed a new president and a new class of students and honored its outgoing ones. The University kicked off its 150th anniversary celebration in September, and just days later was coping with the Sept. 11 disasters with the rest of the nation.

   Tufts students, faculty and alumni earned scores of awards -- including Youth of the Year, Coach of the Year, Entrepreneur of the Year and Designer of the Year.

   And the University's athletes -- students and graduates alike -- secured top finishes on playing fields in New England and around the World.

   Tufts alumni climbed the ranks of their professions in 2001, taking top spots at NBC News, the United Nations, the U.S. Navy, Bristol Myers Squibb, and the Missouri Supreme Court, to name just a few. They earned Pulitzer Prizes and spots in the Halls of Fame for their respective fields.

   Some faced turmoil in hot spots around the world. Others received national attention on reality shows like Survivor and top primetime sitcoms and dramas like Will and Grace, The West Wing and Ed.

   Researchers from across the University made breakthroughs on everything from the brain to E. coli, vitamins to animal hoarding. Tufts scientists produced groundbreaking work on drug development, diabetes, asthma, and stress.

   They figured out how a firefly's flash works, how winter frost affects national economies and how "moments of clarity" occur in the human mind.

   Tufts students earned international attention for their research projects, spots in the 2002 Winter Olympics and invitations to meet President Bush at the White House.

   And in 2001, perhaps more so than any other time in recent memory, the events of just one year have had a major impact on the shape and direction of Tufts' course into the future.

New Faces:

This year's class of first-year students shared a unique bond with University President Lawrence S. Bacow, as both moved into their new homes on campus for the first time. Named president in April, Bacow arrived at Tufts in late summer, just as thousands of Tufts students returned to campus to kick off Tufts' 150th Anniversary celebration.

   Less than two weeks later, however, Bacow, the Tufts community and the rest of the country faced the biggest challenge any had experienced in the last 50 years.

   Impossible to ignore, Sept. 11 redefined the year for the nation -- as worries about the slowing economy and partisan politics were instantly overshadowed by a new focus on international relations and global terrorism.

   Vigils, forums and fund raisers suddenly took center stage on campus, as students and faculty at Tufts and other universities searched for ways to cope with and learn from the national tragedy.

   Despite the fact that the most significant event of the year was filled with devastation and grief, 2001 was largely defined by hope, progress and discovery.

New Discoveries:

As warm summer nights returned to the northeast last year, Tufts scientists announced they had unlocked the secret behind one of the season's most popular features -- the firefly's flash.

   News of the discovery spread around the world, as the Tufts team explained how the insects' twinkling lights work -- a discovery that may help researchers better understand the human brain.

   They were not alone in their discoveries. Their colleagues across the University's three Massachusetts campuses released new findings on the impact of environmental stress on animal populations, new figures on the cost of developing drugs, much needed research on asthma, nutrition and diabetes and groundbreaking research on preventing the spread of E. coli.

   And London's prestigious newspaper The Guardian reported that research conducted at Tufts has unparalleled global importance, ranking the University Number 1 in the world for the impact of its social sciences research.

Important Progress:

The last 12 months can also be defined by a series of initiatives at Tufts designed to improve the neighboring communities, the state and the nation. This year, a new state-wide engineering curriculum designed by Tufts was put in place by the Department of Education, making Massachusetts the first state in the country to incorporate engineering into all of its classrooms.

   The initiative, led by the dean of Tufts' School of Engineering, became a national model and attracted the attention of educators around the country.

   In early fall, Tufts' Veterinary School expanded its successful rabies prevention program by 30 percent, bringing the size of the rabies-free zone to nearly 300 square miles across Cape Cod.

   Excited by the program's results, state legislators have begun to investigate ways to expand the Tufts program to cover an even larger area around the state.

   The Veterinary School also brought renewed hope to the Boston Police Department in the wake of the September's terrorist attacks, raising enough money at the annual Tufts Animal Expo to add a new and much-needed search and rescue dog to the city's K-9 unit.

   And Tufts scientists were on hand as the Environmental Protection Agency awarded a $360,000 grant to a collaborative community project to clean Massachusetts' Mystic River.

   The ambitious program -- which utilizes the engineering expertise of Tufts faculty and students -- is focused on making the river fishable and swimable by 2010.