American University of Armenia

Origins

The idea of an American-style institution of higher education in Armenia has its origin the late 1980s. When Armenia was struck with a devastating earthquake in 1988 the country, then still part of the Soviet Union, was opened to unprecedented international humanitarian and technical assistance. A number of earthquake engineers from the West arrived to Armenia to help in the reconstruction of the disaster zone. In 1989, Yuri Sarkissian, then rector of the Yerevan Polytechnic Institute, suggested to Armen Der Kiureghian, Professor of Civil Engineering at the University of California, Berkeley, that an Armenian technical university based on the Western model ought to be established to foster educational progress in Armenia. The proposition was narrowed to the express goal of creating a graduate university on the American model. Der Kiureghian and another earthquake engineer, Mihran Agbabian, Professor Emeritus at the University of Southern California, set out to realize the goal. A number of American and Armenian academics supported the concept of the university. Der Kiureghian and Agbabian, along with the late Stepan Karamardian, formerly Dean of the A. Gary Anderson Graduate School of Management at the University of California, Riverside, presented their proposal for the university to the Armenian government. Agbabian became the founding president in 1991 and served until 1997.

Two institutions were noteworthy in realizing the establishment of AUA: the Armenian General Benevolent Union (AGBU) and the University of California (UC). In addition, the Armenian government—in particular the Ministry of Higher Education and Sciences (now the Ministry of Education and Science)—offered financial and logistical support for the university from the start in the face of the turbulent political and economic circumstances in Armenia from the period of 1989–1991. The AGBU underwrote a significant portion of the operational funding required to establish AUA. When the UC was asked for its assistance in founding the university, David P. Gardner, then president of the University of California, appointed a task force led by then Senior Vice President for Academic Affairs William R. Frazer to evaluate the possibility of an affiliation between AUA and UC. After the task force's visit to Armenia in July 1990, the Regents of the University of California voted unanimously in favor of an affiliation with the university. Through this affiliation, UC provides technical support and experience for the growth of AUA and collaborates with AUA in preparing a cadre of faculty for the university.

First years

The university was formally established on September 21, 1991, the day Armenia held an independence referendum. The AUA opened its doors on September 23, 1991—the day the Armenian parliament declared the independence of Armenia just two days after the referendum. AUA began instruction with 101 students, who were enrolled in an intensive English language program and later allocated into three graduate degree programs. In 1993 AUA's first commencement took place, where 38 people graduated with master's degrees in Business and Management, Industrial Engineering, and Earthquake Engineering.

The AUA Extension, a program offering short courses and training programs, was established in 1992.

Expansion

The university introduced an undergraduate program in 2013. That year some 300 students were accepted.

The university's two central buildings: the Main Building and the Paramaz Avedisian Building share the same address; they are located at 40 Marshal Baghramyan Avenue in central Yerevan. Baghramyan Avenue is one of Yerevan's major roads, home to the presidential palace and the National Assembly (parliament). The UK embassy stands next to the university's Main Building, while the statue of Soviet Armenian Marshal Ivan Bagramyan (Hovhannes Baghramyan), for whom the avenue is named, was erected in front of the building in 2003.

The university's main building, informally known as the "old building" (հին մասնաշենք), housed the Political Enlightenment House of the Central Committee of the Armenian Communist Party during the Soviet period. It was granted to the AUA by a September 21, 1991 government decision. It has six floors and originally had lecture halls, auditoriums, laboratories, library facilities, and offices. After the construction of the Paramaz Avedisian Building in 2008, it has been used for administrative and nonacademic purposes. The main building has solar panels on its rooftop, which have a total capacity of around 50 kilowatt hour (kWh) and photoelectric capacity of 5 kWh, which secures the continuous operation of the whole system.

The construction of the Paramaz Avedisian Building (PAB) began in 2005. Designed by Gagik Galstyan, it was dedicated on November 1, 2008. Located next to the Main Building, it has some 100,000 square feet of space, which includes classrooms and seminar rooms, laboratories and research centers, offices for faculty.

The AUA Center is located at 9 Alex Manoogian Street in central Yerevan. It is a multiple-use rental facility suitable for business or not-for-profit organization. It has two different conference and meeting rooms and a large auditorium. The center was established in 1999 through financial support of the US government.

In 2005 the AUA acquired the Hye Business Suites Hotel located at 8 Mher Mkrtchyan Street in central Yerevan. It was donated to the university by Vartkes Barsam and is used to house visiting faculty and students and provides additional income for university operation. United States Agency for International Development (USAID) invested $300,000 to renovate and upgrade the building.

The AGBU Papazian Library came into existence in 1991 when AUA was established. It is named after the Papazian family, a generous benefactor of the AUA. As of June 2015 the library contained 45,291 printed book titles and 205,000 digital books, journals, CD/DVD and audio-visual cassettes. Several notable Armenian Americans have donated books to the library, including historian Richard G. Hovannisian, who donated his personal library of 1,338 books to the library; academic and educator Vartan Gregorian, who has been donating books from his personal library to AUA since 2010, a mostly English-language collection which surpassed 600 titles in 2014.

Accreditation

The AUA was accredited by the Western Association of Schools and Colleges (WASC) Senior College and University Commission in 2006. The university had received the candidacy status for accreditation in 2002. The AUA thus became the first university in the former Soviet Union to be accredited by a US educational institution. Accreditation means that degrees issued by the AUA have a status equal to those in United States. By 2013 the university had received accreditation by WASC and a license from the Armenian Ministry of Education and Science to offer four-year education.

Students

The university had around 1,200 students in 2014. According to President Der Kiureghian by 2014 the university had 2,500 graduate alumni 71% of whom lived and worked in Armenia.

Among its notable alumni are:

Graduate

Undergraduate

Presidents

1. Mihran Agbabian (1991–1997)
2. Haroutune Armenian (1997–2009)
3. Bruce Boghosian (2009–2014)
4. Armen Der Kiureghian (2015–)

Rankings and reputation

The American University of Armenia is widely considered one of the top universities in Armenia. It has been described as such by former Education Minister Armen Ashotyan (2009-2016), the U.S. Embassy in Armenia, Armenian Weekly, the Armenian service of Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, independent news agency CivilNet, and other media outlets. AUA has been ranked second (behind the Yerevan State University) in Armenia in at least two rankings:

A 2009 business report prepared by the Michigan State University wrote that "according to those interviewed, the only reputable MBA program in Armenia is offered in Yerevan at the American University of Armenia." According to a 2004 sensitive but unclassified report titled "Corruption Levies Heavy Toll on Armenian Universities" by the Embassy of the United States to Armenia, the AUA is seen by its alumni as the only "clean" non-corrupt university in Armenia, where "students' assessment is performance based." As of 2004 the AUA was one of the four universities in Armenia where public administration was taught.

At his 2015 AUA Commencement Speech US Ambassador Richard Mills stated: "AUA is like no other university in Armenia. At no other school are you challenged to think critically like you are here. As an extension of our well-regarded University of California system, AUA has planted and nurtured informed, critical thinking skills that will stand you in good stead throughout the rest of your lives."

At a June 1994 fundraising banquet for the AUA U.S. Ambassador to Armenia Harry Gilmore stated that the university is one of the "islands of light" in Armenia caught in war and economic hardship, where people been living without heat and light for several years. Gilmore praised the university:

To me, the American University of Armenia exemplifies what is best about Armenian education. When you walk in the doors of the American University, you feel a sense of energy, of purpose. When you look in the computer lab, and see the students at work stations, you could be in any American University. But I think there are very few universities in the United States where the students work with such dedication and enthusiasm. There is another difference--when you talk to the students, you learn they are not there just for themselves, they are there because they want to make Armenia a better place to live for future generations.

Notable visitors and speakers

Among notable individuals who have visited the university and/or have given lectures include Chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee Ed Royce (April 2014), rock singer Serj Tankian (April 2015), President of Armenia Serzh Sargsyan (July 2015), former Governor of Massachusetts and the 1988 Democratic nominee for President Michael Dukakis (April 2016), and Democratic Representative from California Jim Costa (July 2016).