As Duke wraps up its 100th year, The Chronicle takes a look back at the stories that shaped 2024 — characterized not just by the Centennial, but also a historic election cycle, a changing higher education landscape and ongoing campus activism.
The Centennial: Milestones of the past, present and future
No amount of rain — not even a hurricane — could dampen Duke’s Centennial celebrations. Even when it poured on the day of the University’s Jan. 9 Centennial Kick-off event in Cameron Indoor Stadium or when the luckiest members of the Duke community sang along to Ed Sheeran’s “Castle on the Hill” in the residual showers of Hurricane Helene, the Blue Devil community had so much to celebrate.
Throughout the year, the University honored instrumental figures from its past who will continue to shape its present and future. East Campus’ East Union Building, now the George and George-Frank Wall Center for Student Life, honors a father and son who were custodians at Duke and its predecessor institution, Trinity College. Meanwhile, Craven Quad — named after the college’s inaugural president, Braxton Craven — is being reassessed to ensure that the University acknowledges its namesake’s ties to slavery.
One historical building, Lilly Library — also nearing its 100th year — was closed in May for renovations that were initially slated to begin in 2020. The University also announced this spring that it would be shutting down the Duke Herbarium — the second-largest private university herbarium in the country — sparking national controversy in the research community and stirring internal dissent on campus.
But Duke saw some expansions as well, with the beloved Mary Lou Williams Center for Black Culture celebrating its grand reopening in March following 18 months of renovations after a chilled pipe burst and flooded the facility in 2022. Brodie Recreation Center also reopened in June after it was closed for lead dust in April, and University administration took a step to address increased demand for student housing in January by acquiring the Blue Light Living apartment complex.
Amid it all, the University welcomed its 100th incoming class — defined not just by its diversity or all-time-high selectivity, but also by ushering in the next century of Blue Devils. Duke also welcomed back some of its past presidents, who reflected on their role in advancing the University during their tenures and where they hope to see their successors take Duke in its second century. Contributing to that next generation of leadership will be National Basketball Association Commissioner Adam Silver, Trinity ‘84, who was elected in February as the University’s next Board of Trustees chair.
Duke’s Centennial was even honored by the U.S. Congress with a Congressional Resolution, recognizing the University’s accomplishments over the past century.
Continuing to build upon 100 years of progress, the University met its carbon neutrality pledge set in 2007. The achievement placed Duke among just 13 other universities across the country to reach the milestone. In next steps, the University plans to implement solar energy to power half of campus, further lowering the University’s greenhouse gas emissions from 2007 levels.
Affirmative action, admissions and academics
In January, Duke decided to pay $24 million to settle a 2022 antitrust lawsuit where it, alongside 17 other universities, were accused of practicing need-aware admissions. Although the University denies any wrongdoing, it decided to settle to “avoid the wasteful cost and inconvenience of prolonged litigation.” The settlement agreement was approved in July, making current students and alumni reaching back to 2003 eligible for compensation.
Still, the University faced other admissions-related troubles. Almost a year after the U.S. Supreme Court overturned race-based affirmative action in college admissions in the landmark Students for Fair Admissions (SFFA) v. Harvard and SFFA v. University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill cases, Duke announced that it would be ending its historic Reginaldo Howard Memorial Scholarship Program for “top applicants of African descent.” The program has since pivoted to become the Reginaldo Howard Leadership Program, open to undergraduate students of all backgrounds.
SFFA continued to assert pressure on universities across the nation to uphold the Supreme Court ruling, challenging Duke’s compliance after the Class of 2028’s demographic breakdown revealed a six-percentage-point decrease in the proportion of Asian American applicants compared to the Class of 2027.
Those instances do not mark the only times Duke faced scrutiny in the national spotlight this year. In a September 2023 New York Times Magazine article, the University was described as among the “least economically diverse” elite colleges with just about 12% of students being eligible for Pell Grants “in recent years.” However, Duke showed a change in its trajectory, increasing its percentage of Pell Grant-eligible students to 22% in the Class of 2028. Despite this increase, the University announced that it would be raising the cost of attendance for the 2024-25 academic year by 4.35%, bringing tuition to $86,886.
Duke still had many reasons to celebrate, though. The University clinched the No. 6 spot in the U.S. News and World Report's Best National University rankings, the highest it has placed since 2006. In setting other records, Duke admitted an all-time-low 5.1% of applicants in the 2023-24 application cycle — and across the ocean in Kunshan, China, Duke Kunshan University saw an all-time-high enrollment for the Class of 2028 of 490 students, despite the satellite campus’s uncertain future.
The University also made great strides in the academic sphere. For the first time since 2000, the Arts & Sciences Council passed a new curriculum for the Trinity College of Arts & Sciences, with the aim of incorporating a greater focus on the humanities. The curriculum will take effect in fall 2025, with the replacement of the current Modes of Inquiry and Areas of Knowledge core requirements with a new six-category system and the implementation of new course clusters called “Constellations” for first-years.
Campus culture: The election, policy changes and student activism
This year, campus saw a surge of student activism and debates over Duke’s position in the higher education landscape.
Duke’s student political groups rallied their peers ahead of the 2024 general election beginning just weeks after President Joe Biden ended his reelection campaign over the summer, sending the country into an unprecedented race for its top government position. One partisan group, the Duke College Republicans, was revived this fall after a four-year-long period of inactivity.
Throughout the election cycle, Duke saw many prominent political figures on campus, including a surprise visit by Democratic vice presidential nominee Tim Walz just over a week before Election Day. Former Republican Congresswoman Liz Cheney also made a stop on campus in September, where she announced that she would be endorsing Democratic presidential nominee Kamala Harris for president.
The election, which was ultimately called in favor of former President Donald Trump, sparked mixed reactions across campus and also resulted in many of Duke’s Black students being targeted by a racist nationwide post-election text campaign.
In line with student movements across the country, Blue Devils hosted demonstrations and vigils on campus regarding the Israel-Hamas war. Pro-Israel students called on the hostages to be released, hosting vigils and inviting family members of hostages and one speaker who saved over 700 people during the music festival attack to speak at Duke. Meanwhile, pro-Palestinian students called for a ceasefire and demanded the University divest its holdings in Israel and declare a genocide in Gaza. While Duke did not have an encampment of its own, Duke community members participated in the April “Triangle Gaza Solidarity Encampment” at UNC-Chapel Hill, where one professor and seven students were arrested.
The decision to have Jewish actor and comedian Jerry Seinfeld deliver the Class of 2024’s commencement address further heightened tensions on campus. Pro-Palestinian students staged a walk-out during their graduation, opting instead to host an alternative ceremony on Abele Quad.
In an effort to foster productive and respectful campus dialogue in response to the conflict, Provost Alec Gallimore announced the Provost’s Initiative on the Middle East in February, which featured several speaker events throughout the year. Some of these events have been controversial, including a Nov. 19 conversation with former Israeli Attorney General Avichai Mandelblit, where protesters and counter-protesters from both sides were placed under investigation by the University for violating its newly updated Pickets, Protests and Demonstrations policy.
Amid national debate over politically contentious issues, a group of Duke professors rallied together to petition the University to adopt an official policy of institutional neutrality. The call came after institutions such as Harvard University and the University of Pennsylvania announced that they would become institutionally neutral — however, the move does not have universal support at Duke. Since, conversations have also sparked over academic freedom, with a new Academic Council committee formed in April to update the University’s outdated policy on the matter.
The Duke Graduate Student Union also made its presence heard on campus this year, hosting rallies calling on the University to engage in bargaining sessions and provide graduate students with better pay.
Durham and beyond
Local and state elections consumed the attention of North Carolinians — eventually making national headlines, too. The North Carolina gubernatorial race to fill Gov. Roy Cooper’s seat came down to Democratic Attorney General Josh Stein — who ended up winning the election — and Republican Lt. Gov. Mark Robinson. In September, a bombshell CNN article revealed disturbing comments allegedly made by Robinson, which he has since denied.
Cooper also briefly emerged as one of Harris’ potential running mates, though he ultimately decided to remove his name from consideration. Entangling North Carolina further into national politics, independent presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., sued the N.C. State Board of Elections to take his name off of the state’s ballot in an attempt to support Trump’s bid in the swing state.
Out-of-state Duke students looking to vote in North Carolina faced challenges at the ballot box after the NCSBE ruled that the mobile DukeCard did not comply with state voter identification laws. In response to the decision, the DukeCard Office collaborated with DukeVotes to issue physical cards to students before Election Day.
Ever since Duke abandoned Central Campus in 2019, plans for the land have been unclear. However, in October, Durham City Council approved Duke’s rezoning application for 10 parcels near Central Campus despite previous community pushback. Although those parcels are not included in Duke’s 2024 Illustrative Master Plan, the University expressed its intent to engage with Durham residents and the Duke community to develop the property in the future.
Durham residents have continued to engage with the University through the “Duke Respect Durham” movement, which calls on the University to make voluntary payments in lieu of property taxes to the city. While Duke made large-sum payments to the city in 2023 and has contributed financially to its home state’s development for years, residents insist the University is still not doing enough.
Durham City Council also appointed Deputy City Manager Bo Ferguson to be Durham’s new city manager, after former City Manager Wanda Page announced her decision to resign after years of service to the city.
Sports
Both Blue Devil basketball teams went on deep March Madness runs to kick off 2024. The men’s team — seeded No. 4 in the South Region — defeated Vermont, James Madison and No. 1-seed Houston en route to an Elite Eight battle with conference foe N.C. State. The Wolfpack’s Cinderella story continued as they defeated Duke 76-64 behind 29 points from graduate forward DJ Burns Jr. Head coach Kara Lawson’s women’s squad stunned No. 2-seed Ohio State at its home court to advance to the Sweet 16 for the first time since 2018. Duke’s season ended there, though, as perennial powerhouse UConn beat the Blue Devils 53-45.
It was a summer to remember for Duke’s ball and bat teams. In the program’s seventh season, Duke softball won the Durham Regional and defeated Missouri in a win-or-go-home matchup in the Super Regionals to advance to the team’s first ever Women’s College World Series. As the No. 6 seed, Duke baseball marched through the ACC Tournament and capped it off with a dominant 16-4 victory against Florida State in the championship game.
New Duke football head coach Manny Diaz — whose remarkable career started as a student journalist and volunteer assistant — led his team to an impressive nine-win regular season. This included come-from-behind victories against North Carolina and Northwestern, and a last-second win at Wake Forest.
But the best season for any squad came from Duke women’s soccer in legendary head coach Robbie Church’s final season. The Blue Devils overcame an opening loss and went on a 15-game undefeated streak as the No. 1 team in the country. They cruised through the early postseason rounds, but their storybook ending fell short at the hands of rival North Carolina in the College Cup semifinals in Cary.
This season’s basketball teams are also primed for deep postseason runs. The men’s team – led by No. 1 recruit Cooper Flagg — has won seven consecutive games, including an 84-78 victory in Cameron Indoor against No. 2 Auburn. Lawson’s squad has emerged 10-3 from a gauntlet nonconference schedule and will look to make a run at the ACC title.
The Chronicle reported on some of the biggest stories around college sports. The House v. NCAA settlement — which will pave the way for schools to directly pay players — got its preliminary approval in May, and if finalized, will go into effect for the 2025-26 school year.
Duke’s cross country and track athletes reported neglect under former coach Angela Reckart, who departed the program at the conclusion of the 2024 season. At the end of the year, Crystal Mangum admitted she fabricated the rape accusations against David Evans, Collin Finnerty and Reade Seligmann in the infamous 2006 Duke lacrosse case. She apologized and asked for forgiveness in an interview with host Katerena DePasquale published in December on her show “Let’s Talk with Kat.”
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Abby Spiller is a Trinity junior and editor-in-chief of The Chronicle's 120th volume.