Commencement Celebration That Felt All the More Joyous, Given the Last 15 Months
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ommencement C 2021 Wake Forest University Sunday, May 16 Magnificent Wake Forest Class of 2021: My sincere congratulations on your graduation, shared by all of us faculty and staff at Wake Forest — now our fellow alma mater. I’ll forever remember hearing your individual names called — in the Joel, unusually — and seeing so many of your faces turned to the fireworks-lit night sky over Truist Field on Sunday night. A commencement celebration that felt all the more joyous, given the last 15 months. And amid all the storms, you persevered: a collective rebuke to the tedious claims about your generation’s lack of resilience. And now, as I overlook a quiet Quad, we are missing you ’21ers, the life-spirit of campus during your senior year. Whether mask-to-mask or via Zoom, your scholarly creativity, performative grace, innate curiosity, and magical ability to make lemonade out of pandemic lemons: a host of reminders of how fortunate we are that you chose Wake Forest for your undergraduate years. We are a stronger and better community thanks to your time with us. I wish each of you fulfillment in your next endeavors—and hope you’ll return this fall and many years hereafter, for Homecoming or any time your paths lead you to Winston-Salem. Congratulations, again, on this profound accomplishment. And, of course: Go Deacs! Yours in admiration and respect, Rogan Kersh ('86) Provost PRESIDENT NATHAN O. HATCH CommencementSUNDAY, MAY 16, 2021, Celebration 8:30 P.M, TRUIST FIELDRemarks Good evening! Today is a very special day for Wake Forest It is too soon for any of us to know exactly what we have University and its Class of 2021. It is worth a 21-gun learned over the last 15 months. That will take time. We salute, a fireworks extravaganza, and most importantly, know we have taken on unexpected challenges, worked now that we are permitted, the warmest embrace of through dark nights of soul isolation, and coped with deep family and friends. For the last 15 months, all of us frustration at the loss of expectations for what a senior have lived in the valley of the shadow with the reality of year in college should look like. COVID-19 conspiring to rob us of much that is best about But I am confident of one thing: the adversity you have a residential college experience. Instead of conversation experienced has and will make you a stronger and wiser and engagement, we faced isolation. Instead of coming person. Like gold being refined in a furnace, the trials together for concerts, lectures, and sporting events, we of this year will work to strengthen your character and stayed huddled in our rooms. Instead of gathering with make you much more capable of the challenges ahead friends in close companionship and endless discussion, as you go forth from this place. C. S. Lewis once noted we were forced to stay to ourselves. And while many of that, “Hardships often prepare ordinary people for an us felt insecurity and fear because of the disease, others extraordinary destiny.” came to know the pain of loss as loved ones and friends succumbed to this pestilence among us. I am amazed, when I read the stories of notable people, how often trial and adversity steeled them to become who I am so grateful for where we are tonight, together in they were. person, with COVID receding and the vaccine giving us hope for a return to patterns of normal living — which It was living through the horrors of the trenches in World once we took for granted but now relish like the sweet War I that helped shape the vivid imagination and creative scent that fills the air after a passing storm. COVID may vision of the authors C.S. Lewis and J.R.R. Tolkien. not be fully behind us, but its grip on us has been broken, and tonight, we can celebrate with grateful hearts and Both Oprah Winfrey and Maya Angelou had wretched renewed hope. and abusive experiences when they were young. But they turned those experiences into inspiration that led to them I want to salute you, the Class of 2021, for all that becoming life-giving people. you have done to achieve this milestone — for your diligence amidst adversity, your courage to take on new Benjamin Franklin had to drop out of formal schooling risks, your patience and good will in trying times and after his 10th birthday because his parents couldn’t afford changing conditions, and your commitment to each it. That setback only fired his curiosity. other and to Wake Forest in sustaining this as a viable Franklin Roosevelt became paralyzed at 39, but that learning community. I am so proud of you — for your only stiffened his resolve. Steven Spielberg twice was perseverance and grit, your good cheer amidst difficulty, rejected as a student at USC film school. Jimmy Carter and for your commitment to finish well. You have done a was only admitted to the Naval Academy after three years remarkable job, and tonight, we honor and celebrate you. 2 of trying. And Apple founder Steve Jobs, in a famous have unfolded over several years. I invite you to reflect on commencement address at Stanford, admitted that the all of your years here and take in the whole experience. I best thing that ever happened to him was getting fired imagine it is rich with moments of connection with others from the company he had started because it forced him to and personal growth. rethink many of his assumptions. When I think back on the 16 years that Julie and I have My point is that the severe trials you have experienced been at Wake Forest, I will remember the glistening this year are not just something wasted and lost. You have buildings of Wake Downtown and Farrell Hall and the not been marking time, even if this year was not what you renewed Reynolds Gym. I will remember new academic wanted or expected. I would not want to underestimate programs, the Office of Personal and Career Development, the pain and disappointment you may have experienced; efforts in diversity and a magnificent capital campaign. but neither would I want to underestimate the strength of I will remember the Atrium deal, which takes academic character that has been forged in these last months. In the medicine from something at risk to a long-term position long run, over the course of your life, what you have gone of strength. I will remember new athletic facilities and through will stand you in good stead. As the English poet exulting in some great athletic wins. And I will remember William Cowper once wrote: “The bud may have a bitter the people — all firmly committed and invested in the taste, but sweet will be the flower.” success of the students, mission and future of Wake Forest. I can think of no major accomplishment that has not been There is a saying that “a struggling vine makes the best launched by committed teams uniting together on behalf wine.” The goal of high-end wine grape growers is not to of this community. produce the most grapes, but the best grapes. To do that, the vine needs to struggle a little. A vine that has plentiful The most strenuous test of the Wake Forest community water and fertilizer produces many grapes, but not better has taken place this year. Together, we demonstrated grapes. A vine that encounters some struggle — sparse resilience, a strong work ethic, good will and abundant water and less fertile soil — pours its energy into making grace. Wherever you go and whatever you do, I know fewer, but better grapes. Fewer, high quality grapes make you will carry these values forward and be outstanding for rare, richer wine. representatives of Wake Forest University. We may not see the fruits of the trials we have faced these Author, advocate and educator Helen Keller said, last few months just yet, but I am certain they will appear. “Character cannot be developed in ease and quiet. Only Like a lot of life experience, we may not have chosen this through experience of trial and suffering can the soul be experience or wanted to go through these months, but strengthened, ambition inspired and success achieved.” the lessons we will draw from this time are certain to be Today, as you leave Wake Forest, may you see your time abundant. Though it might not be obvious, I hope that in here as one that has been refining. May you eagerly look coming years, when you look back at this time, you will for the lessons that come from the adversity you have see how the trials and experiences fit into place. faced. And may you consider it joy when you experience Class of 2021, you hold a special place in my heart. Not trials of many kinds — knowing that testing produces only do we share the experience of having to respond to perseverance, and perseverance yields character, and the COVID-19 pandemic, we also leave Wake Forest at character gives us hope. the same time. While we have been dramatically shaped Thank you. by the last several months, our Wake Forest experiences 3 TheSUNDAY, Graduation MAY THE SIXTEENTH Exercises TWO THOUSAND AND TWENTY-ONE LAWRENCE JOEL VETERANS MEMORIAL COLISEUM PROCESSIONAL .....................................................................Led by Faculty Marshals INVOCATION ..................................................... Liz Orr, Associate Chaplain for Catholic Life Naijla Faizi, Associate Chaplain for Muslim Life The Rev. K. Monet Rice-Jalloh, Associate University Chaplain Gail Bretan, Associate Chaplain for Jewish Life WELCOME ...............................................................................