In her address to the freshman convocation, Hockfield called Faraday's approach to his work "very MIT,” describing him as a "fearless and untiring experimentalist — the greatest of his age and among the greatest of any other." The president noted that many of the recent research achievements by MIT faculty can be directly traced back to Faraday’s important discoveries — and she urged incoming students to follow in his path.
“Let us remember that he is united with us not only by what he achieved, but by how he achieved it: his fascination with nature and his endless capacity for good, old-fashioned hard work; his daring intellectual leaps and painstaking experimentation; his patient attention and impatient creativity; his irrepressible desire to help others see as clearly as he did — and to use his knowledge for the good of all,” she said.
