A Belief That Built a University: Vytautas Magnus University’s Journey and Global Lithuanian Community
Prof. Dr. Ineta Dabašinskienė, Rector of Vytautas Magnus University
Each new phase in a university’s life requires not only solutions but also memory. As we enter a new era of Vytautas Magnus University’s development, we would like to look back on how this university was built.
Vytautas Magnus University was reestablished at the dawn of independence, when Lithuania was still learning what freedom meant: without guarantees or resources, but with a clear determination to be different. This was a choice rooted in values: to create a university based on openness to the world, academic freedom, and trust in an individual and their conscience. The Lithuanian diaspora believed in this choice as well – perhaps even earlier and with more conviction than many in Lithuania, because they had preserved the memory of university culture and the standard of free thinking.
On the Path of Artes Liberales
Vytautas Magnus University, which was being reestablished at the time, was more of an idea rather than an institution; more of a promise than a guarantee; more of a belief than a fact. The first Rector of the reestablished VMU, Professor Algirdas Avižienis recalled that the university started its work “with dusty chalk and scribbles in notebooks”, but also established a very clear direction: to invest not in facades but in the person – their mind and conscience. The project’s central axis was academic freedom not as a privilege but as a necessary condition for a free society. In his inaugural speech, Prof. Avižienis emphasised: “The first and most important task is to create the conditions that make it possible to fully implement the principle of academic freedom” and warned that restrictions on university freedom always signals deeper problems: cultural, economic, and democratic decline.
Professor Algirdas Avižienis’s Swearing-in as Rector of VMU. 3 September 1990
The Lithuanian diaspora didn’t just hear this message: they recognised it. For many of them, university was not just a place of studies, but also a civilizational home that nurtures free citizens. For this reason, supporting Vytautas Magnus University wasn’t so much an aid to a young institution as a decision based on values: a belief that there is no free state without a free university. This belief was particularly sharply reflected in the attitude of diaspora sponsors. Julija and Emilis Sinkis, who had supported the university for many years, highlighted that the greatest wealth of a nation is not its natural resources or finances but a well-educated person who has the disposition and opportunity to work for the common good.
This modern, future-oriented perspective became an organic part of VMU’s identity. From the beginning, VMU stood out because of its conscious choice to take the path of artes liberales: comprehensive, broad-range education, interdisciplinarity, the ability to combine the humanities, social, natural, and technological sciences. This tradition was strongly inspired by the U.S. university culture, which was brought in by many of the diaspora academics and sponsors. It established VMU as an unconventional university that was open to discussion and critical thinking: something different by its very nature.
In time, university has grown, expanded, and strengthened. Today, VMU is a large, multifaceted university which concerns itself with innovations, technological progress, interactions between science and business, and regional and international partnerships. However, as it grows, it’s vital not to lose sight of the foundation that keeps the university from being led astray by the logic of quick fixes and short-term gain.
VMU students
VMU – the Home of Lithuanians Worldwide in the Face of Change
Throughout the decades, the diaspora’s support for VMU has taken many forms: scholarships, academic exchanges, visiting professorships, and named funds. The university has been and continues to be sponsored by the Lithuanian Foundation, the Kazickas Family Foundation, the Vydūnas Youth Foundation, the Lithuanian National Foundation, the Canadian Lithuanian Foundation, the Bronius Vaškelis Fund, the Fund Dedicated to the Memory of Vytautas Čekanauskas, as well as individual donors and families, such as Irene Birutė Jakowich, Liūtas and Françoise Mockūnas, and Romas and Emilija Sakadolskis. These names testify not to numbers, but to a long-term commitment to the university, its mission, and a deep concern for Lithuania’s future.
Naturally, we will not mention all names and good deeds. However, all of them are in our memories and our hearts – as the people whose conviction helped the university remain true to itself.
Today, we are facing a new epochal shift. Technological changes occur faster than ever before. Democracies around the world are becoming increasingly fragile. There is a war raging nearby, reminding us that freedom and peace are not a given. Geopolitical threats force us to rethink the role of the state, the culture, and the university. Thus, universities must once again return to their essence and, instead of institutions that serve markets and short-term political agendas, they have to be the places that preserve humanity, critical thinking, and the ability to recognize complex connections and act responsibly in this historical time.
In this context, there is a particular relevance to the words of the Director of VMU Lithuanian Emigration Institute, Professor Egidijus Aleksandravičius, who urges us to hold on to belief as “the greatest miracle of humanity – the will to change and the duty to delight. Without it, survival is impossible. Without it, compassion and understanding between different people for the common good are impossible. It prevents us from turning off the light at the end of the tunnel”.
VMU Connections. Everything Starts at VMU: A Discussion with Alumni
Vytautas Magnus University is starting a new stage, in which leadership is not a farewell to the past. It is the assumption of responsibility to preserve what has been built by belief and, at the same time, to seek new forms of functioning in today’s world. It is my duty – and the duty of the entire university community – to ensure that VMU remains open to the world, stays true to its values, and that academic freedom, a strong sense of community, and responsibility are part of our everyday practice, not merely a declaration.
In today’s world of change, we need new bridges: not just support, but shared ideas, joint projects, and mutual responsibility for the academic and civic culture we are building.
Vytautas Magnus University aims to continue to be the home of the Lithuanian diaspora: the place where Lithuanian identity opens outward instead of closing in on itself. It is our common creation, born out of belief and sustained by belief. And only through shared belief will it be able to act in the future, be free, responsible, and human.
This text is both a Thank-You and a testimony that a free university is not a relic of the past but a necessity for the future and that the Lithuanian diaspora has been, and remains, a pillar of this university, its co-creators.
THANK YOU, on behalf of the entire VMU Community.
Prof. Dr. Ineta Dabašinskienė
Rector of Vytautas Magnus University
