MELIKIANS BOOST ASU’S GLOBAL ENGAGEMENT
Carol Hughes
Arizona State University, Tempe
Feb 6 2007
ASU’s commitment to global engagement received a major boost in the
form of a $1 million contribution by two longtime Phoenix civic
leaders and philanthropists: Gregory Melikian and his wife, Emma
Ordjanian Melikian.
Gregory Melikian, left, and his wife, Emma Ordjanian Melikian, pose
Jan. 30 with Stephen Batalden, director of the new Melikian Center,
at the ceremony at the University Club on the Tempe campus to announce
their $1 million contribution to the center.
Their gift will fund the expansion of international programming at the
university’s Russian and East European Studies Center, a unit in the
College of Liberal Arts and Sciences that will be renamed the Melikian
Center in recognition of the university’s partnership with the couple.
The center’s programming features the internationally recognized
Critical Languages Institute, which offers intensive instruction
every summer in less-commonly taught languages of Eastern Europe and
Eurasia , including Armenian, Albanian, Macedonian, Tatar and Uzbek.
The center’s strategic partnerships with major universities of the
region – notably its linkages with Yerevan State University, Moscow
State University, the University of Sarajevo, Ss. Kiril and Metodij
University (Macedonia) and the University of Pristina – have been
supported by grants from the U.S. Department of State and U.S. Agency
for International Development.
"This major contribution from the Melikians brings the study of Eurasia
and Eastern Europe into ASU’s wider scope of global engagement that
already includes important programming in China and Mexico," says
ASU President Michael Crow. "Programs like these are at the heart of
ASU’s global engagement efforts."
In 2001, an endowment from the couple led to the creation of the
Melikian Fund, which supports the study of Armenian language and
culture at ASU. In announcing this recent $1 million gift, center
director and ASU professor Stephen Batalden says the Melikians’
generosity will make a difference in the lives of students and faculty,
a difference that often has transformative results.
"At a time when the geopolitical significance of the Eurasian Islamic
rim has never been greater, this gift from the Melikians will offer
students at ASU a unique research and language training opportunity
for the 21st century," Batalden says.
In commenting on the growing importance to understand the history,
language and culture of Eurasia and Eastern Europe, Gregory Melikian
says: "What better way to communicate than to speak each other’s
language? These are critical languages, and there is a critical need
in the world today for people who can speak these languages fluently."
The Melikians are of Armenian descent, and between them they speak
numerous languages, including Russian and Armenian.
"Our world is shrinking," notes Emma Melikian. "And to understand
all people of the world – and participate in global engagement – our
future generation has to speak critical languages and know history
to help America in the world arena."
This latest gift by the Melikians follows a history of commitment
and giving to ASU. In addition to the creation of the Melikian Fund,
Gregory Melikian has donated to the university’s Special Collections
eight World War II dispatches, including a copy of the message sent by
Supreme Allied Commander Eisenhower announcing the end of World War II
in Europe . Melikian, an Army Signal Corps sergeant at the time, was
tasked with sending the original high-speed radio transmission of the
message, a copy of which he saved in plain text on a Signal Corps form.
Gregory Melikian, who says with a chuckle that, as a senior citizen,
he always has admired longevity, began his long-term relationship with
ASU in the 1970s, while serving on the board of the Friends of Eight,
a volunteer organization at the university’s PBS-affiliated television
station Eight.
The Melikians are owners of the historic Hotel San Carlos in downtown
Phoenix and have been generous supporters of education and the arts
in Arizona . Gregory Melikian has been a board member of the Phoenix
Symphony and served as president of the Arizona Opera Company. Emma
Ordjanian Melikian has served on the board of the Asian Arts Council
of the Phoenix Art Museum . She is the founding president of the Thank
You America Foundation, an organization in support of educational
opportunities for homeless and abused children of Arizona . For that,
she has received the George Washington Medal of Honor from the Freedoms
Foundation at Valley Forge in 1999, the Outstanding Achievement Award
from the Daughters of the American Revolution and the Alpha Delta
Kappa Woman of Distinguished Award in 2002. She also has been active
in the National Society of Arts and Letters for more than 20 years.
Additionally, the Melikians are among the original donors to the
Armenian Cultural Center in Scottsdale. Their three sons and a daughter
– Robert, Richard, James and Ramona – have attended ASU.
More information about the Melikian Center and ASU’s Russian, Eurasian
and East European Studies program is available at (480) 965-4188 or
online at ().