Spring Commencement 2019

The sky seems indecisive the morning of May 10, 2019. The families, the graduating students, the faculty and staff of the Franklin College and the University of Georgia are not. It is a great day.

It is graduation day - all the work, all the hope, tears and toil, sweat, friends, relief, awards, disappointment, anxiety, triumph. All of it has been for this. Our graduates (and their supportive network of family and friends) have done it! They look out onto an enormous world with unlimited possibility and the the expansive power of knowledge at their sides.

We yield to the inspiring remarks of novelist Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie in her address to the Wellesley College class of 2015:

We can not always bend the world into the shapes we want but we can try, we can make a concerted and real and true effort. And you are privileged that, because of your education here, you have already been given many of the tools that you will need to try. Always just try. Because you never know.

And so as you graduate, as you deal with your excitement and your doubts today, I urge you to try and create the world you want to live in.

Minister to the world in a way that can change it. Minister radically in a real, active, practical, get your hands dirty way.

Stirring advice, and much more will be shared in the stadium this evening and the Coliseum Saturday. Enjoy the moments, heed the words and well wishes, ring the Chapel Bell and congratulations Class of 2019!