Here is a selection of commencement speeches of the 2018 class. The notable ones, as always, are by Democrats, Progressives and Liberal thinkers and doers. There are plenty of other commencement speeches yet to be made in the 2018 graduation season.
We start with Tim Cook, a Duke Fuqua alumnus and CEO of Apple, who delivered the commencement address to the Class of 2018 on May 13. “Be Fearless”. Transcript at time.com/…
Oprah at USC, May 11 — “Stop Comparing Yourself to Other People".
“You will become the new editorial gate-keepers, an ambitious army of truth-seekers who will arm yourselves with the intelligence, with the insights and the facts necessary to strike down deceit. You can answer false narratives with real information and you can set the record straight."
Chadwick Boseman, the Black Panther himself, at Howard U, May 12. “I don’t know what your future is, but if you’re willing to take the harder way, the more complicated one, the one with more failures at first than successes, then you will not regret it.”
Ronan Farrow at LMU, May 5, “Because more than ever we need people to be guided by their own senses of principle—and not the whims of a culture that prizes ambition, and sensationalism, and celebrity, and vulgarity, and doing whatever it takes to win. Because if enough of you listen to that voice—if enough of you prove that this generation isn’t going to make the same mistakes as the one before—then doing the right thing won’t seem as rare, or as hard, or as special.”
Amal Clooney at Vanderbilt, May 11. "Be courageous. Challenge orthodoxy. Stand up for what you believe in. When you are in your rocking chair talking to your grandchildren many years from now, be sure you have a good story to tell."
Bloomberg at Rice, May 12 — “Epidemic of dishonesty” — “How did we go from a president who could not tell a lie to politicians who cannot tell the truth?”
And here is a cringe-worthy one from the dark side — Pence at Hillsdale College, a private, ultra-conservative Christian college in Michigan, on May 12. “Because Donald Trump is now president, more Americans believe in God”. Betsy DeVos and Erik Prince are graduates of the college.
You may need to take shower if you watched that speech or you can watch Obama at Howard U. in 2016, who set the standard on commencement speeches.
Others
news.berkeley.edu/… — Pictures and videos of UCB commencement
In a tumultuous and triumphant year, women are dominating as college commencement speakers — www.cnn.com/...
Epilogue
This is just the beginning of the graduation season; there are plenty more commencements to come. Here are few to look forward to -
- Queen Latifah, Rutgers, May 14.
- Justin Trudeau, New York Univ., May 16
- Peace Corps. director Jody Olsen, Univ. of Maryland, Baltimore, May 18.
- Al Gore, Univ. of Maryland, College Park, May 20.
- Hillary Clinton, Yale May 21.
- April Ryan, Goucher College, May 25.
- Sheryl Sandberg, MIT, Jun 8
You can see a partial list at www.graduationwisdom.com/….
Updates
Rex Tillerson at Virginia Military Institute, May 16.
“Preserve and protect our freedom by recognizing what truth is and is not, what a fact is and is not; demand our pursuit of America’s future be fact-based, not based on wishful thinking, not hoped-for outcomes made in shallow promises.”
“In your career, you will have occasions where it may appear easier to take a shortcut. The pressure you feel may come from within, that you need to impress others or that you need to have all the answers. Unfortunately, it may also come from your organization or directly from a supervisor or a coworker.”
Wonder who he is talking about?
Justin Trudeau at New York University in Yankee Stadium, May 16. “As you go forward from this place, I would like you to make a point of reaching out to people whose beliefs and values differ from your own. I would like you to listen, truly listen, and try to understand them.”
“And that’s the question: Do you want to win an argument or do you want to change the world?”
Transcript at time.com/….
Al Gore at Univ of Maryland, May 20 — “American democracy is in much graver danger than many now assume."
Hillary Clinton at Yale, May 21 -
Jimmy Carter at Liberty University -