Past Commencement Videos
2024 Commencement
The 2024 Middlebury College Commencement ceremony, held on Sunday, May 26, 2024.
[ Music ] [ Applause, Cheering ]
Michelle McCauley: Please rise. Please rise, as you are able, for the National Anthem. I get to keep practicing, right? It’s never right once. All right, let’s try this again. Good morning, Middlebury. >> [Unison] Good morning. Please rise, as you are able, for the National Anthem, sung by Marco Motroni, a member of the Class of 2025. [ Applause, Cheering ] [ Applause ]
Marco Motroni: Okay.
Male Speaker: Good luck. [ Music ]
Marco Matroni: [Singing] O say, can you see, by the dawn’s early light. What so proudly we hailed at the twilight’s last gleaming. Whose broad stripes and bright stars, through the perilous fight. O’er the ramparts we watched, were so gallantly streaming? And the rockets’ red glare, the bombs bursting in air. Gave proof through the night that our flag was still there. O say, does that star spangled banner yet wave. O’er the land of the free and the home of the brave? [ Applause ]
Laurie Patton: You may be seated. Good morning, Middlebury. >> [Unison] Good morning. No, no, no, no, no, no, not good enough. I want everybody. Good morning, Middlebury. >> [Unison] Good morning. My name is Laurie Patton. I am the President of Middlebury. And on behalf of the Middlebury trustees and faculty, I would like to welcome you to this celebration of the accomplishments of the members of the Middlebury College, Class of 2024. [ Applause, Cheering ] [ Applause ] I am so delighted that we are here together this morning. And now I’d like to invite Rabbi Danielle Stillman, associate chaplain at the college, to read our land acceptance. And to give the invocation. [ Applause ]
Danielle Stillman: We pause to acknowledge that Middlebury College sits on land which has served as a site of meeting and exchange among indigenous peoples since time immemorial. The Western Abenaki are the traditional caretakers of these Vermont lands and waters, which they call Ndakinna, or homeland. We remember their connection to this region and the hardships they continue to endure. Let us take a moment of silence to pay respect to the Abenaki Elders and to the indigenous inhabitants of Turtle Island, past and present. [ Silence ] We give thanks for the opportunity to share in the bounty of this place and to protect it. We are all one in the sacred web of life that connects people, animals, plants, air, water, and earth. Oh source of all, today, now, we call on the mystery to be with us. As the poet Dylan Thomas described it, the force that through the green fuse drives the flower. May that force surround us here, graduates, families, beloved teachers, mentors, and friends. May we step now into joy and celebration, even as we see and feel and care deeply about the sorrow sweeping the world around us. May we affirm with our joy the imperative we each have to give ourselves over to the full range of human experience. Let us bless the force that infuses us, that drives us, that keeps us alive and brings us to this time. In the words of the ancient Hebrew prayer that is recited when we arrive at a new moment and a sacred occasion in our lives. [ Foreign language ] Blessed are you, Eternal One, Source of New Beginnings, who has kept us alive and established us and brought us to this moment. Amen.
Laurie Patton: Good morning again. Graduates, today is your day. And we hope that you enjoy it to the fullest. I would note that the students who we recognize today have worked tremendously hard to reach this moment. We are so proud of them as individuals and as a class. But we know that they did not get to this moment on their own. So students and guests, please join me now in recognizing parents, grandparents, family members, chosen family members, friends of our graduating seniors whose devotion and support enabled them to be here today. Thank you all. [ Applause ] I also want to thank the members of the college staff, many of whom are here today, whose many hours of preparation have helped make this Commencement possible. Middlebury is so fortunate to have a truly dedicated staff who have been hard at work for weeks and since very early this morning setting up this site, preparing refreshments, planting flowers, bringing the programs and diplomas for distribution, and doing countless other tasks. Would everyone please join me now in thanking the amazing Middlebury College staff for their much appreciated efforts. [ Applause, Cheering ] [ Applause ] And to our faculty, you are the heart of this institution and your commitment to teaching and scholarship reverberates throughout the world every time we send new graduates on their way. Class of 2024 and families and friends, please join me in thanking our and your professors. [ Applause ] And speaking of dedication, I would like to ask you to join me in recognizing the members of our community who have retired or will retire at the end of this academic year. The members of the faculty who have retired or will retire at the end of the academic year are Priscilla Bremser, Timi Mayer, Paul Minot [assumed spelling], and Tim Spears. And staff members retiring with more than 25 years of service to the college are Arabella Holzapfel, Ronald Munson [assumed spelling], Ken Pohlman, Mary Stanley, Don Sommer [assumed spelling], and Michael Warner. Let’s thank them and all retirees for their many years of service and dedication to Middlebury and our students. [ Applause ] And finally, on a really fun note, let us thank Damascus Kafumbe and Middlebury’s Afropop Band, who provided the music as we took our seats. [ Applause ] The Constitution Brass Quintet and bagpiper Tim Cummings, who gets us in and gets us out with such dignity and elegance. [ Applause ] And I am really pleased to note that some of our graduating seniors are not able to be with us this morning. Why? Because senior Robby Ward has been selected to compete in the NCAA Individual Championships with his doubles partner, Neel Epstein, Class of ‘25, in St. Louis, Missouri. Robby and Neel will be playing their match against a team from Denison this afternoon. And — [ Applause ] — the number one ranked Middlebury women’s lacrosse team advanced to the NCAA Final Four last week. [ Applause ] On Friday, they played the semifinal game in Salem, Virginia against Franklin and Marshall, and they won 15 to 9. So today, some of your classmates aren’t with us because, they are going to be playing for the national championship against Salisbury University today, at noon. [ Applause ] We wish them all the best, and we will celebrate graduation later this week upon their return. So now, in Middlebury’s early years, every member of the student body, every member, delivered remarks at Commencement. Imagine that. We would be here considerably longer than we will be today. And then, about 150 years ago, the students’ speeches at Commencement faded out. And then, in 2000, our bicentennial year, we restored a student speech to the ceremony. This year’s student address will be delivered by Adelia Lee [assumed spelling]. [ Applause, Cheering ] [ Applause ] Adelia is a graduating senior from Somerset, New Jersey. Having matriculated in fall 2020, that tough, tough, tough fall, Adelia has witnessed the many ups and downs that this campus has to offer in its varying phases. Following graduation, she will be heading to Alaska for the summer before gearing up to teach English with Teach For America. Please join me in welcoming Adelia. [ Applause, Cheering ] [ Applause ]
Adelia Lee: For those of us who graduated from high school in 2020, welcome to our very first graduation. [ Applause ] And to those who didn’t matriculate with us, well, it’s probably about time you found yourself on this lawn. Can you remember those long hours we all spent waiting idly in our cars, waving through cracked windows, slowly slithering through the Ridgeline parking lot? I remember the moment my parents drove away, leaving me to spend the rest of my 19th birthday organizing my whole life into a 100-square-foot room. Looking back on that day and the 1,369 days in between, it’s hard for me to believe that today has come. From the first moment we stepped outside our rooms, negative test results in our inboxes and masked up, we took the campus by storm. From one panther apart, we formed a community. I know for me, those first few weeks proved laborious, from sitting around on the grass in circles making countless introductions to trying to figure out how I would ever feel at home in a place so alien. Yet somehow, I did. With the help of my school-sanctioned 10 close contacts, I discovered what Middlebury had to offer, and found comfort in the changing seasons. Very quickly, those first few weeks turned to fall, followed by the first snowfall. And when the sun returned along the horizon, bringing in the first sweet moments of spring, I felt myself thaw and acclimate to my new home, finding my place as a non-athletic regular person. Now looking back at the many seasons we’ve spent together on this campus, I know I’ll miss the first few radiant hues of fall, and warm afternoons spent basking in the sun. While those moments are now only memories, I know that scattered across the globe will carry these sentiments with us. Our experiences at Middlebury will serve as an anchor, grounding us in the rhythm of the seasons. Whether you find yourself in bustling cities or tranquil countryside’s, the memory of fall foliage painting the campus in hues of red and gold, or the quiet beauty of a winter snowfall, blanketing the landscape will undoubtedly resurface. These seasonal markers will not only remind us of the passage of time, but also of the growth and transformation we underwent during our time at Middlebury. Embarking on the next chapter of our lives, emerging from the vibrant renewal of late spring, we will continue to follow the cyclical patterns of the Earth. However, there are some patterns that should be broken. As we sit on this lawn, celebrating our academic successes, taking in the last of what this place has to offer and our time as students, we must turn our attention to those we have lost and continue to mourn. I would like us to recognize Yan Zhou, Professor Raquel Albarran, Evelyn Mae Sorensen, and Ivan Valerio, who all passed away during our four years here. These members of our community were all part of marginalized groups who suffered from the standards of the toxic work culture that permeates the fabric of our campus. Even as there is a genocide happening before our very eyes, being live-streamed across the world, the majority of the student body continues on with life as normal. I too have found myself yearning for normalcy. However, there is no normalcy during genocide. In the 232 days since October 7th, at least 35,000 Palestinians have been killed, including over 14,000 children. And hundreds of thousands of families, just like those that are here today, have been displaced in their homeland. I bring this up before you all today because the place that we have called home for four years, is complicit in these atrocities. This matters to me as it should matter to all of you, because the money that is paid for my education is tied to the destruction of all universities in Gaza. Standing on this stage, moments away from graduating myself, I think of all the Gazan students who cannot graduate from their universities because they have all been destroyed. And for all of the students on this campus, our friends and peers, who cannot go about their daily lives because their people are dying, we need to keep talking about Palestine. [ Applause, Cheering ] As members of the Middlebury community, I ask you to continue standing in solidarity with those who call for divestment and the freedom of Palestine. In the coming hours, as we transition from students to alumni, I urge you to consider withholding donations to this institution as long as Middlebury continues to fund genocide. [ Applause, Cheering ] The work does not stop now that we are done with our assignments and transitioned out of our roles as student leaders. We must continue to stand up for each other, for BIPOC and LGBTQ plus communities, and those who are silenced by the oppressive regimes that strangle our society. Class of 2024, going out into the world, we must take what we have learned in our four years and break these cycles in our everyday lives. The memories and lessons from our collective college experiences, serve as examples for what we will face in the real world, and how we can navigate these new challenges as informed individuals. Stepping forward into our futures, celebrate what you have accomplished here, remember how much we have overcome together. The strength we have as a community does not dissipate as we leave this campus, but continues to evolve as we push the boundaries and resist injustice for a free Palestine and for liberation for all. Thank you. [ Applause, Cheering ]
Laurie Patton: Thank you, Adelia. Every year since 1981, the members of the senior class have honored their time at Middlebury and marked their graduation by making a gift to the college. This year, members of the Class of 2024 and 2024.5 chose to support mental health resources through the Mental Health and Wellness Programs Endowment Fund. [ Applause ] This fund aims to enhance and diversify the college’s mental health resources and ensure they are accessible to all students. Your class was challenged to reach at least 200 donors. You exceeded your goal, 253 of your classmates have come together and supported this gift. In doing so, your class unlocked an additional gift from Chris Brown, Class of 2003. In total, you raised $21,104.94, and your participation is a wonderful expression of your continuing connection to Middlebury. I’d like to recognize the senior class gift team, Gianna Palli, Caitlin Baxter, Lea Hohenlohe, Naja Irvin-Conyers, and Brian Mejia for their leadership in encouraging so many members of the senior class to participate in ensuring the success of this particularly meaningful gift. Thank you, members of this fabulous, fabulous graduating class. Thank you to Chris and to everyone else who contributed to this gift. We deeply appreciate your commitment to Middlebury. [ Applause ] Later this morning, every graduating senior will receive a replica of Gamaliel Painter’s cane along with a diploma. Gamaliel Painter was one of the founders of Middlebury College, and when he died, he left his estate to the college, including his walking stick, which he was often seen carrying across campus and around town. His cane has become the college’s mace, carried by the president at all academic ceremonial occasions to signify Middlebury’s founding spirit, its optimism, and its future. Today, we will give you each your own cane, handcrafted here in Vermont, of New England birch and ash to carry forward into your life as alumni and to bring back for a union. This cane has many, many other stories besides the official one that we just told, stories of the workers who made it, stories of the women and men from all backgrounds and ethnicities who live and work in the households of Vermont where this cane and others stood in the hallways, stories of the groves of trees which provided the wood, and the Native Americans who cared for them. We are only beginning to tell these stories, and we ask you to remember them as you journey from here. These canes are a symbol of the historical ties that bind us to this institution, the generosity that supports us, and the hard work and learning that brought you to this place today as a graduate of Middlebury College. The canes will be presented by Janine Hetherington, Class of 1995, parent of a Class of 2024, and past president of Middlebury Alumni Society. I would now like to begin the presentation of the honorary degrees. I invite Middlebury trustee Emeritus Churchill Franklin, Tracy Himmel Isham, and coaches Mike Leonard and Kelly Bevere to come forward to present Joseph J. Castiglione for his honorary degree. [ Applause ]
Churchill Franklin: President Patton, I have the honor to present for the degree of Doctor of Humane Letters Joseph J. Castiglione.
Laurie Patton: Joseph Castiglione, Boston Red Sox announcer, author, lecturer, and member of the Red Sox Hall of Fame, your connection to Middlebury runs deep. Your uncle Salvatore and aunt Pierina Castiglione were beloved Italian professors at Middlebury, and your sister Cheryl, is a member of the Class of 1972. Sports announcing has been your calling since your earliest days in the booth as an undergraduate at Colgate and a graduate student at Syracuse. You began your professional career in Ohio, where you eventually began calling games for Cleveland teams before finding your place with the Red Sox broadcast team in the early 1980s. Since then, for 42 years, you’ve kept Boston fans tuned to the radio so they can follow your coverage of the team. As the team’s lead announcer, you’ve shared the Red Sox’s most epic moments with listeners, most notably your famous exclamation when the team had won the 2004 World Series. “Can you believe it?” In addition to your broadcasting, you’ve authored two books telling stories from your career, Broadcast Rights and Sights; I Saw It on the Radio with the Boston Red Sox, and Can You Believe It; 30 Years of Insider Stories with the Boston Red Sox. You also helped educate the next generation of sports broadcasters for almost 30 years as a lecturer of communication studies at Northeastern University. You’ve been named the 2024 recipient of the Ford C. Frick Award, presented annually for excellence in broadcasting by the National Baseball Hall of Fame and Museum and the Fenway Park Broadcast Booth, now officially known as the Joe Castiglione Booth, recognizing you as the longest-serving radio broadcaster in Boston sports history. Can you believe it? [ Laughter ] It is therefore my privilege, by virtue of the authority vested in me by the Board of Trustees of Middlebury, to confer upon you the degree of Doctor of Humane Letters, honoris causa, with all the rights, honors, privileges, and responsibilities here and everywhere pertaining to this degree. Congratulations. [ Applause ] [ Applause ] I now invite Middlebury trustee Karen Stolley, Dana Olson, and Professor Carlos Velez to come forward to present Michael R. Katz for his honorary degree. [ Applause ]
Female Speaker: President Patton, I have the honor to present for the degree Doctor of Humane Letters, Michael R. Katz.
Laurie Patton: Michael Katz, C.V. Starr, Professor Emeritus of Russian and Eastern European Studies, author, translator, and scholar, you opened the world of Russian novels to audiences of English speakers. After Williams College, we’ll forgive you, where you were the first Russian major, you earned your Ph.D. from Oxford University on a Keasbey scholarship and studied at the University of Leningrad as part of a US-USSR cultural exchange. In Leningrad, you worked at the Institute of Russian Literature and the Russian Language Institute, where you studied Russian poetry. Before moving to prose and writing a book about dreams in Russian literature. From there, you began your translation career with more than 20 translations of great Russian literature, from Crime and Punishment to Notes from the Underground to last year’s acclaimed translation of Dostoyevsky’s The Brothers Karamazov, which was named one of the best books of 2023. As a professor and as dean of the Middlebury Language Schools, you taught hundreds of students about the beauty and complexity of a region, its language, and its literature. Although you retired from the faculty in 2010, you continue to shape Middlebury students’ lives with the courses you teach during winter term and at the Bread Loaf School of English. You are the embodiment of the passion for inquiry, creativity, and understanding beyond borders that Middlebury holds most dear. It is therefore my privilege, by virtue of the authority vested in me by the Board of Trustees of Middlebury, to confer upon you the degree of Doctor of Humane Letters, Honoris Causa, with all the rights, honors, privileges, and responsibilities here and everywhere pertaining to this degree. Congratulations. [ Applause ] [ Applause ] I now invite Middlebury trustee Leilani Brown, Nicole Kirvan [assumed spelling], and Professor Tara Affolter to come forward to present Linda Cliatt-Wayman for her honorary degree. [ Applause ]
Leilani Brown: President Patton, I have the honor to present for the degree of Doctor of Education, Linda Cliatt-Wayman.
Laurie Patton: Linda Cliatt-Wayman, educator, author, and inspiration to children, teachers, and families, you know firsthand the power of transformational education. After a childhood spent in poverty in North Philadelphia, you earned your bachelor’s from Kutztown University and your master’s degree from St. Joseph University. For 20 years, you were a special educator with a firm belief in ending poverty for as many students as possible through education. You became a school principal in 2003 and helped lead Fitzsimmons High School from underachieving and a violent space to being a safe space to learn. You then opened the Young Women’s Leadership School at North Philadelphia’s Rhodes High School. Through setting and holding high standards, supporting staff, and believing in and loving your students, you transformed Rhodes from a school with low student proficiency to one where 94% of students were admitted to college. [ Applause ] At Strawberry Mansion High School, you and your team again inspired positive change with test scores dramatically improving and the school being removed from the federal government’s list of persistently dangerous schools. Your 2015 TED Talk, How to Fix a Broken School, Lead Fearlessly, Love Hard, has been viewed more than 2.4 million times. After retiring from Strawberry Mansion in 2017, you founded the non-profit Currently Trending, which is dedicated to preventing high school students from dropping out by helping them understand how to work hard, develop study habits, and enhance their reading and writing skills, while also exposing them to a wide variety of professions. In short, you have changed the trajectory of thousands of students’ lives by letting them know that you believe in them and their potential, and you share your love. It is therefore my privilege, by virtue of the authority vested in me by the Board of Trustees at Middlebury, to confer upon you the degree of Doctor of Education, honoris causa, with all the rights, honors, privileges, and responsibilities here and everywhere pertaining to this degree. Congratulations. [ Applause ] [ Applause ] I now invite Middlebury Trustee, Caroline McBride, HaQuyen Pham, and Professor Mark Williams to come forward to present Emily Elizabeth Welty and Matthew Breay Bolton for their honorary degrees. [ Applause ]
Female Speaker: President Patton, I have the honor to present, for the degree of Doctor of Humanities, Emily Elizabeth Welty and Matthew Breay Bolton.
Laurie Patton: Emily Welty, you are an academic, activist, ecumenist, playwright, and artist who is helping to lead critical conversations on faith-based peacebuilding and nonviolent social movements. As the founder and chair of Peace and Justice Studies at Pace University, one of the largest peace and justice programs in the United States, your work focuses on nonviolence, humanitarianism, reconciliation, transitional justice, and the role of the arts in peacebuilding. You were part of the 2017 Nobel Peace Prize winning International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons and a member of the New York campaign to abolish nuclear weapons, which persuaded the New York City Council to call on NYC to divest its pension funds from nuclear weapons. You also have served as vice moderator of the World Council of Churches Commission of the Churches on International Affairs and shared their nuclear disarmament working group. And you were the main representative to the United Nations for the International Peace Research Association. Your career and your life are inspiring examples of how we can advance the causes of peace, justice, and nonproliferation. It is therefore my privilege by virtue of the authority vested in me by the Board of Trustees of Middlebury to confer upon you the degree of Doctor of Humanities, honoris causa, with all the rights, honors, privileges, and responsibilities here and everywhere pertaining to this degree. [ Applause ] Matthew Breay Bolton, Professor and Peace Activist, together with your wife Emily Welty, you co-direct the International Disarmament Institute at Pace University, where you explore the impact of weapons, pathways to disarmament, arms control, and nonproliferation, and monitoring and evaluating disarmament programs. You are part, too, of the Nobel Prize-winning International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons, where you highlight the concern of coastal communities affected by nuclear weapons development and testing from the South Pacific to New York City. As an aid worker in Bosnia and Iraq, you saw how landmines impacted people in the environment which led to your work investigating the politics of landmines and cluster munition clearance in Eastern Europe and Asia. Your emerging research explores politics in a more than human world, from the role of islands and international relations to bear human conflict in the Adirondack Mountains. From your books including Imagining Disarmament and Chanting International Relations to your research and activism, you challenge us to reconsider our preconceived ideas of what is possible in our quest for a more peaceful future. It is therefore my privilege, by virtue of the authority vested in me by the Board of Trustees of Middlebury, to confer upon you the degree of Doctor of Humanities, honoris causa, with all the rights, honors, privileges, and responsibilities here and everywhere pertaining to this degree. Congratulations [ Applause ] [ Applause ] I now invite Middlebury trustee Ted Truscott, Michelle McCauley, and Bill McKibben to come forward to present Terry Tempest Williams for her honorary degree. [ Applause ]
Male Speaker: President Patton, I have the honor to present for the degree of Doctor of Humane Letters, Terry Tempest Williams.
Laurie Patton: Terry Tempest Williams, acclaimed author, citizen writer, environmentalist, and social justice advocate, you have played a critical role in our understanding of environmental justice while enriching our literary landscape with your books. Growing up within sight of the Great Salt Lake, your awareness of our place in the natural world was fueled by both Utah’s arid natural beauty and the U.S. government’s mid-century atomic testing that exposed many in your region, including your family, to radiation. Becoming an educator after earning your bachelor’s in English and your master’s in environmental education, you taught in the Navajo Nation and then at the University of Utah, where you founded the university’s Environmental Humanities Master’s Program. Your writing career began with the 1984 children’s book, Secret Language of Snow, which won the National Science Foundation Book Award, followed by Pieces of White Shell, A Journey to Navajoland, and your memoir, Refuge; An Unnatural History of Family and Place. Your 1995 book, Testimony; Writers of the West Speak on Behalf of Utah Wilderness which you co-edited, was credited by President Bill Clinton as having made a difference in preserving the Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument, and you yourself preserved more than 1,700 acres of land in Utah by purchasing oil and gas leases from the federal government, thereby keeping the land away from energy development. Now a writer-in-residence at Harvard Divinity School, you’ve been honored with the Robert Marshall Award from the Wilderness Society, the highest honor it gives to American citizens, the Distinguished Achievement Award from the Western Literature Association, the Wallace Stegner Award from the Center of the American West, the David R. Brower Conservation Award for Activism, the Sierra Club John Muir Award, and the Lannan Literary Award for Nonfiction. And today we celebrate your contributions to ecological consciousness and social change. It is therefore my privilege, by virtue of the authority vested in me by the Board of Trustees of Middlebury, to confer upon you the degree of Doctor of Humane Letters, honoris causa, with all the rights, honors, privileges, and responsibilities here and everywhere pertaining to this degree. Congratulations. [ Applause ] [ Applause ]
Terry Tempest Williams: I told Bill McKibben, if I pass out, he will continue. You are so beautiful, Class of 2024. Thank you, President Patton, Board of Trustees, colleagues. It is such a privilege to receive this honorary degree from Middlebury College alongside my other colleagues from a school I love and one that has been part of my own educational landscape. Members of my chosen family are here. Bill McKibben and Sue Halpern, alumna Bianca Giaever, and my activist daughter from Utah, Mishka Banuri, who is graduating today. And a deep bow to my mentor, John Elder. To the Class of 2024, the People of the Eclipse, the name given to you by President Patton for the light you shine in these shadowed times, we see you, we hear you, and we honor the arduous path that has been yours in these four years with the support of your family, your friends, and colleagues. This is a celebratory moment, a historic moment, and not an easy one. Thank you for allowing me to stand with you and be part of this monumental day. You have shown us as Audre Lorde, the poet, did, your silences will not protect you. And you have spoken, each in your own ways with the gifts that are yours, in your spheres of influences, with commitments made and delivered. Congratulations. I come to you from Utah, where Great Salt Lake, located in the heart of the American West, our inland sea, is shrinking, threatening to dry up within the next five years due to overuse of water and climate change, manifesting in a mega drought not seen in 2,500 years, if we do nothing. If we fail to get more water back in the lake, toxic winds will blow off the now exposed lake bed, risking 2 million lives along the Wasatch Front. We are watching the Great Salt Lake ecosystem collapse from brine shrimp and brine flies to the 12 million birds who depend on these food sources migrating to these saline waters to rest, to breed, and to gather strength for the next journey. Great Salt Lake continues to teach me how to find refuge in change. Last month, we brought 16 students from the Harvard Divinity School, to Great Salt Lake. They were expecting a pilgrimage of grief in the presence of a dying body of water. What they found was a shimmering landscape of joy. There is so much beauty that remains. On one excursion, we traveled to the Sun Tunnels, a piece of land art created by Nancy Holt on the west side of the lake, where four concrete cylinders, 18 feet in length and nine feet in diameter, are arranged in an open cross format, aligned to frame the sun on the horizon during summer and winter solstices. On the day we were there, we were met by 85 mile per hour winds, with no barriers for protection, but the Sun Tunnels themselves, that from afar appear as hollow bird bones on the desert that could blow away. I asked the students if they wanted to leave. We were vulnerable. They said no. For safety purposes, I radioed the rangers on Antelope Island of our quadrants, and told them we were staying. When I turned around, the students were gone, poof, gone, vanished. And then I heard something and began walking toward what I thought was music. The students were singing inside one of the Sun Tunnels, tucked safely inside, alternating head, feet, head, feet, head, feet, so all their bodies could fit. They were singing the song that spontaneously came to them, accompanied by the wind. They found their voices in the storm. And they were not afraid. They had each other. The louder the wind howled, the more powerful their voices became, until their song seemed to soften the blow of the storm. Storms are blowing around the world, physically and metaphorically. The winds of change are strong. We have a history of bravery in this country, and we must call it forward now. A livable future is guaranteed only by our degree of personal engagement, the size of our hearts, the risks we are willing to take, and our commitments to build trust in our capacity to work together among our differences. We can mobilize our creativity and care in the name of a just world for all, beyond our backyards, even beyond our own species. To the students who participated in the encampment in Middlebury, and to the varied student body who were asked to contemplate the meaning, there is a dignified tradition of civil disobedience. From Henry David Thoreau and the abolitionists opposed to slavery, to Susan B. Anthony and the suffragettes demanding the right for women to vote, to Martin Luther King and the freedom fighters in the civil rights movement. To gay rights activists protesting at the Stonewall Inn in New York. To the leadership of Bill McKibben, and the students who founded 350.org right here, at Middlebury College in 2007. Recognizing, putting us on notice, that climate change is the most important issue facing humanity. They did change the political weather system, which led to a decade-long hard and successful fight, culminating in Middlebury’s commitment to divest from fossil fuels, and it is happening now. One can imagine today’s activists changing Middlebury’s mind once again, to divest from manufacturing arms in the name of peace-building. [ Applause, Cheering ] [ Applause ] Thank you for your civil disobedience, offering up your voices on behalf of peace, sustaining social and environmental justice in the fertile gardens of dissent. Your voices matter. Engaging in civil dialogue, all of us, through varied points of view, while honoring our differences, which are beautiful and painful and instructive, where empathy and compassion are cultivating respect, it’s deeply American. What appears to be destructive on our college campuses and universities, I believe is actually generative. As exemplified by the process that is in place at Middlebury, with the students, the administration, faculty and staff who are finding common values, committed to what Wallace Stegner, a fellow Vermonter, called, a society to match the scenery. In his words, this is the geography of hope. Democracy is messy, and change can be dramatic, but it is worth the toil and toll it takes to travel to new places of understanding, to be stretched, to lead us to transformative actions. It starts with ourselves. So where do we look for guidance in these turbulent times? I follow my heart, and I would ask you to trust yours. Here’s why. The heart is the first home of democracy. It is where we embrace our questions. Can we be equitable? Can we be generous? Can we listen with our whole beings, not just our minds, and offer our attention rather than our opinions? And do we have enough resolve in our hearts to act courageously, relentlessly, without giving up, ever? Trusting our fellow citizens to join us with a determined pursuit of a living, breathing democracy? The heart is the path to wisdom because it dares to be vulnerable in the presence of power. Our power lies in our love of our own home ground. If the open space of democracy feels like it is closing inside our divided states of America, the remedy is here, with you and your fellow graduates today, celebrating, in the midst of your diverse disciplines, identities, and beliefs. I trust you. We trust you. Side by side, you are singing with the winds, changing the orientation of your hearts, our hearts, that is deepening all of our capacity to not look away, but to stay with the troubles. These issues that keep us awake at night will not allow — and that do not allow us to sleep, the wars, the weather, the dismissal of one another’s views that too often descend into violence, are interconnected and interrelated. The crisis we find ourselves in, whether it is in the Middle East, in the humanitarian crisis in Gaza, or here at home, where we are banning birth control in some states and protecting the reproductive rights of women in others. Where we are screaming drill baby drill, on one hand and divesting from fossil fuels, without the other. These issues cannot be seen simply as part of our political crisis. This is also our spiritual crisis, demanding our devotions. Each of you is on a spiritual journey, uniquely yours. Let these challenging times open your hearts, not close them. We lose nothing by loving. The heartbreak my community in the Salt Lake Valley is feeling over the possible death of Great Salt Lake is actually bringing us together, regardless of our differing opinions over the causes and solutions. We care. We care enough to work this out together, and we are being led by indigenous leaders. We are embracing the vitality of the struggle, and it is opening our hearts because we are getting to know one another as human beings, not as people of positions. And we have to if we are to succeed. Our grief has become our love, and we cannot fail. Our lives depend on it, both human and wild. A bird’s eye view of Great Salt Lake or from a plane looks like a bloodletting, and it is cellular. So high is the salt content due to extreme heat leading to extreme evaporation. The only life forms that can survive are called halophytes, salt-tolerant organisms that turn the water blood red. I can tell you it’s unnerving, it’s disorienting, and it is impossible not to see the body of Great Salt Lake as our own bodies in beauty and terror. Emily Dickinson writes, life is a spell so exquisite, everything conspires to break it. How can we not respond? Not long after I graduated from the University of Utah, I made a decision to cross the line at the Nevada test site and committed civil disobedience in the name of the women in my family. Nine women in my family have all had mastectomies and seven are dead as a result of nuclear fallout in the desert. At that time, they were still testing nuclear bombs in the desert. As one officer cinched my — as one officer cinched the handcuffs around my wrists, another officer frisked my body. She found a pen and a pad of paper tucked inside my left boot. “And these,” she asked? “Weapons,” I replied. Our eyes met. I smiled. The officer pulled the leg of my trousers back over my boot. It was in that moment I became a writer. I was no longer afraid. I knew where I stood, and I knew what I stood for and who I stood with. The community I was creating was on the page. I knew where my authority came from. I ask you to learn where yours comes from. Our hearts in place together. I wanted to change the world, but instead the world changed me. And then I realized it’s the same thing. To care and to be carried toward one’s purpose is an action akin to love. As President Patton said yesterday in her baccalaureate address, you can help and heal the world. You are, and you will. To care is neither conservative or radical, writes John Ralston Saul. It is a change in consciousness. This is the task before all of us. Being conscious of where we stand and what we stand for and with whom. This is the power of belonging to a community who cares. Many communities with great heart. There are many ways to engage at the heart level as we face the heartbreaks and difficulties of this moment. We can sing. We can sing into the winds of change. If we are present in the moment, this moment, we will know what to do. Finding beauty in a broken world is creating beauty in the world we find. In a gesture of solidarity, hands over our hearts, hand over your heart, can you feel your heart beating, alive, here, now, together? This is the geography of hope. This is the site of beautiful disturbances and disruptive discourses, beginning with yourself that will radiate outward as light, a stay against darkness. Bless us in our differences and the differences we make. You have a voice, and we hear you, and we believe in you. Cheers to you, the Class of 2024, to your beautiful revolutionary hearts, dearest People of the Eclipse. [ Applause ]
Michelle McCauley: Thank you, thank you, Terry, for your amazing, inspiring address. And for joining us at this Commencement. My name is Michelle McCauley. I’m executive vice president and provost and psychology professor at Middlebury. President Patton is about to begin conferral of the bachelor’s degrees. In a moment, I will ask the senior class to rise. And when you rise, please put on your mortarboards with the tassel on the right side. After President Patton has completed the statement to confer the degree, all of you together move tassel from right to left, signifying you have obtained the bachelor of art degree. Now, will the candidates for the degree of bachelor of arts at Middlebury College, Class of 2024, please rise. [ Applause, Cheering ] [ Applause ] President Patton, on behalf of the faculty of Middlebury College, I have the high privilege of presenting to you, the candidates for degree of bachelor of arts, the members of the Middlebury College, Class of 2024. [ Applause ]
Laurie Patton: Now, inasmuch as each of you, presented to me, has completed the requirements for the degree of bachelor of arts, I have the honor, by virtue of the authority vested in me by the trustees of Middlebury, to confer upon you, the degree of bachelor of arts with all the rights, honors, privileges, and responsibilities here and everywhere pertaining to this degree. Congratulations. [ Applause, Cheering ] [ Applause ]
Michelle McCauley: The first diplomas to be presented are those to the valedictorian. This year, we have three valedictorians. The valedictorians are, Megan Janet Paasche. [ Applause, Cheering ] Gabriella Joyce Roelofs. [ Applause ] And Dylan T. Taylor. [ Applause ] Megan is from Grand Rapids, Michigan, and is a mathematics major. She is the corecipients of the George H. Catlin Fund and the George H. Catlin Prize. [ Applause ] Gabriella is a March 1 graduate, and she cannot be with us today. She is from Newburyport, Massachusetts, and was an environmental studies, chemistry joint major, and a food studies minor. She is the corecipients of the George H. Catlin Fund and the George H. Catlin Prize. [ Applause ] And Dylan is from Woodside, California. He is an economics major and a corecipients of the George H. Catlin Fund, George H. Catlin Prize, also the Harry M. Fife Prize, the Christine A. Johnson Prize in Economics. [ Applause ] We shall now begin presenting the remaining diplomas by department and program. Vice President of Student Affairs, Smita Ruzicka, Dean of the Faculty, Jim Ralph, will read the names of the graduates. Each senior will come forward, be greeted by President Patton, receive their diploma from the department chair or program director, and receive a cane from Janie Hetherington of the Middlebury Alumni Association.
Jim Ralph: Professor Will Nash will present the diplomas for the program in American Studies. [ Applause ]
Michelle McCauley: The other graduates can go down.
Jim Ralph: Oh, all the other graduates can sit at this moment. [ Laughter ] Christopher Borter. [ Applause ] Angelina Gomes. [ Applause, Cheering ] Nathaly Martinez, recipient of the Ryan Fairman Waldron Class of ‘97 Award. [ Applause, Cheering ] [ Applause ] Professor Michael Sheridan will present the diplomas for the Department of Anthropology. Turner Britz. [ Applause, Cheering ] Lile Casey. [ Applause, Cheering ] Charles Deichman-Caswell. [ Applause, Cheering ] [ Applause ] Jessica Hong. [ Applause, Cheering ] Carinna Kinnaman. [ Applause, Cheering ] Olivia Oehrle. [ Applause, Cheering ] Zixi Zhao, the recipient of the Margaret K. Nelson Award in Critical Sociology. [ Applause, Cheering ] Professor Samuel Liebhaber will present the diploma for the Department of Arabic. Nicholas Dahlen. Recipient of the Parkerian Award and the Phi Beta Kappa Prize. [ Applause, Cheering ] Professor Dave Allen will present the diplomas for the Department of Biology. Andy de Leon. [ Applause, Cheering ] John DiBari. [ Applause, Cheering ] Hamia Sophia Fatima. [ Applause, Cheering ] Makeda Hevrin. [ Applause, Cheering ] Sarah Hurlock. [ Applause, Cheering ] Noah Laber. [ Applause, Cheering ] Emily Lee Leib. [ Applause, Cheering ] Tanaya Newsome. [ Applause, Cheering ] Oliver Patrick. Recipient of the Michael Moss Class of ‘16 Prize in Environmental Studies. Audrey Rossbach. Luna Simone-Gonzalez. [ Applause, Cheering ] Steil Steii. Elizabeth Toll. [ Applause, Cheering ] Luke Van Horn. [ Applause, Cheering ] S. Grady Welsh. Recipient of the Elbert C. Cole 1915 Memorial Fund Prize and the Barry Goldwater Scholarship. Louisa Wright. [ Applause, Cheering ] Professor AJ Vasiliou will present the diplomas for the Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry. Baker Angstman. [ Applause ] Katie Baker. [ Applause, Cheering ] Emily Downer. [ Applause, Cheering ] [ Applause ] Annika Edwards. [ Applause, Cheering ] [ Applause ] Charles Forbes. [ Applause, Cheering ] Kailey Gagne. [ Applause, Cheering ] [ Applause ] Caroline Greene. [ Applause, Cheering ] [ Applause ] Thomas Hemphill. [ Applause ] Levi Hoffman. [ Applause, Cheering ] Hans Kindstedt. [ Applause ] Benjamin Liu. [ Applause, Cheering ] [ Applause ] Noah Rizika. [ Applause, Cheering ] Mary Robinson. [ Applause, Cheering ] Paige Swanson. [ Applause, Cheering ] Amatullah Tawawalla. [ Applause, Cheering ] Tobias Ziemke. Recipient of the American Chemical Society Award for Excellence in Chemistry and Biochemistry and National Science Foundation Graduate Research Fellowship. [ Applause, Cheering ] Professor Carrie Wiebe will present the diplomas for the Greenberg-Starr Department of Chinese Language and Literature. [ Clapping ] Moorea Bell. [ Cheering, applause ] Samuel Maxwell. Tristan Midlik. [ Applause, cheering ] Nadjingar Ngbokoli. [ Applause, cheering ] Juliette Schofield. Charles Stecker. Professor Pavlos Sfyroeras will present the diplomas for the Eve Adler Department of Classics. The major in classical studies, Emily Wight. And the major in Classics, Madeline Pappano. Krithika Vasireddy, recipient of the George H. Catlin Classical Prize. Professor Roman Graf will present — Professor Roman Graf will present diploma for the program of Comparative Literature. Shamail Naseer. [ Applause, cheering ] Professor Amy Briggs will present the diplomas for the Department of Computer Science. Siri Ahern. Nusrat Atiyah. Kaitlin Baxter. John Rev Bermudez. Jeffrey Blake. Jacob Bradley. Kent Brylle Canonigo. Sirui Chen. Lauren Clarke. Daniela Delgado. [ Applause, cheering ] Vy Diep. Iris Ethier. Oscar Fleet. Lucas Flemming. Manuel Fors. Jake Gilbert. James Hackney. Caroline Haggerty. James Heatherington. [ Applause, cheering ] Julia Joy. Lila Kosowsky. Brittany Lange. Ethan Lavallee. Haiyu Luo. Jake Lyons.
Male 1: Yeah, Jake!
Male 2: Come on, Jake!
Male 3: Katie Macalintal, winner of the Timothy T. Wong Award. John Vincent Manalac. Abraham Merino. Otis Milliken. Charles Moore. Alexander Oh.
Female 1: Alex! Yeah!
Male 3: Tobias Pouler. Johana Ramirez. Lindsey Schweitzer. Elisabeth Seiple. Mihir Singh. Sartaj Singh. Eric Tran. Huy Tran. Benjamin Weisenbeck. Donovan Wood. Alejandra Yepiz Medina. Zihao Yuan. Cecilia Ziegler. Professor Will Amidon will present the diplomas for the Department of Earth and Climate Sciences. Elizabeth Austin, recipient of the Udall Undergraduate Scholarship. Theresa Barth. Elise Chan, recipient of the John M. White Class of ‘52 Memorial Award. Ethan DeMaio. Aaron Hansgrohe. Molly Klingner. Amanda Manoogian. Juliana Martinez. Lila Olson. Emmett Schmehling. [ Applause, cheering ]
Female 2: Hello? Can you hear me now? All right. We’re back in business. Professor David Munro will present the diplomas for the Department of Economics. Sophia Afsar-Keshmiri. [ Applause, whistle blowing ] Trustee Kashif Zafar ‘92 will help present the diploma to his nephew, Adil Alvi. [ Applause, cheering ] Kavina Amin. Catherine Appleyard. Derek Ban. Christian A. Johnson Prize in Economics, D.K. Smith Economics Prize. Patrick Bogart. Katherine Burke. Sorry, she’s playing lacrosse. We wish her the best. Lucas Cai. Cian Callahan. Alexander Clarke. Thomas Conley. James Cosolito. Alexandra Cossette. Colin Crawford. Matthew Dailey. Amy Delman. Peisheng Dong. Charles Doyle. Sawyer Duarte. Mariia Dzoholos. [ Cheering ] Recipient FC Dirk’s Prize in Economics, Harry M. Fife Memorial Prize, Christian A. Johnson Prize in Economics. Brendan Easter. Natalie Caitlin Eddy, Christian A. Johnson Prize in Economics. [ Whistle blowing ] [ Cheering, applause ] Travis Emery, Christian A. Johnson Prize in Economics. Gülce Dilay Erdem. Edwin Fan, J. William Fulbright Foreign Scholarship Award. Scott Fischer. Andrew Frame. Gavin Gattuso. Riley Griffis. Greta Hannam. Aidan Harris, Hazeltine-Klevenow Memorial Trophy. John Hodulik. Andrej Hromic. Evan Hunter. FengYi Ji. Georgia Joers. Carl Kellogg. Maximus Kim. Jaeden Lee. Tyler Leinan. Benjamin Lesch. Mengxiao Ma. Huthefa Maalim. [ Applause, cheering ] Joseph Mairs. Colin McCaigue. Sophia Merageas. Zachary Milton. Nolan Moore. Andrew Mueller. Kevin Ntoni. James Ohr. Gianna Maria Palli. Evan Park. Dr. Mark Peluso, Chief Health Officer and College and Head Team Physician will present the diploma to his son, Jacob Peluso. [ Applause, cheering ] [ Laughter ] William Procter, Christian A. Johnson Prize in Economics. >> Male 4:What’s up, Will?
Male 3: Malachi Raymond. Cameron Riley. Carson Robinson. Jaden Roderique. William Ryan. Christopher Saavedra-Méndez. Nikhil Sachar. Sanjay Sadarangani. Luke Simpson. Jacqueline Slinkard, Christian A. Johnson Memorial Prize in Economics. Samuel Smith. Peter Steinle. Aaron Tobias, Christian A. Johnson Prize in Economics. Jameel Uddin. Noé Vyizigiro. Jack Waitz, Christian A. Johnson Prize in Economics. Jiaan Wang. Xingze Wang. Kaylynn Xia. Jade Bing Zalaznik. William Zink. Professor Christina Johnson will present the diplomas for the Program in Education Studies. Ashley Chimelis, Samuel Guarnaccia ‘30, MA Senior Prize, the John and Irene Mangione Memorial Award in Education Studies. Evelyn Magdaleno, the John and Irene Mangione Memorial Award in Education Studies. Professor Marion Wells will present the diplomas for the Department of English. Pierre Yaw Asamoah. Akbarali Aziz Jr. Sidney Chodosh. Kylie Crow. Paige Cusanelli. Hannah Dorosin. Sophia Glenister. Inaijah-Iman Irvin-Conyers. [ Applause, cheering ] Acadia Klepeis, Mary Dunning Thwing Prize. Arthur Lyu, Reid L. Carr Prize of 1901. Margaret Mead-McCaughan, Stolley-Ryan American Literature Prize. Brian Mejia. Sarah Miller. Sylas Pelikan. Natalie Penna, Donald Everett Axinn ‘51 Annual Prize. Susanna Schatz. Chloe Snider. Sairam Srinivasan. John Torpey. Ashling Walsh. Alexander White. [ Applause, screaming ] Professor Christopher Kleiser will present the diplomas for the Program in Environmental Studies. Andrew Atallah. Colin Breen. Diana Cortez. Charles Crounse. Zoe Crute. Ryan Devine. Kathryn Elliott-Grunes. Hannah Ennis. Ayusha Gautam. Maya Heikkinen. Emily Hogan. Kyle Hooker. Eleanor Hughes. Kian Jain. Charlotte Keohane. Emily Kuperstein. Corrine Lowmanstone. Justin Lucas. Kyle Matthys. Shivapriya Sudhakaran Nair. Anna Notaro. Sarah Jane O’Connor. Cassia Park. Tatum Peskin.
Female 3: Natasha!
Female 2: Eli Richardson. Joshua Rosenstein. Marlow Saucier. Aidan Shepardson. Graves Thomas. Pearl Tulay. Joshua Valentine. Kristen Watkins. [ Cheering ] Abigail Watts. Isaac Xie. Professor Louisa Stein will present the diplomas for the Department of Film and Media Culture. Aylin Adzin. Naomi Clark. Zoe Eng. Andriiana Ilkiv. Dayan Zip Malley. John McCulloch. Max Walters. Yinuo Wan. Keziah Wilde. Amelia Zottola. Marian Zottola. Professor Laurie Essig will present the diplomas for the program in Gender, Sexuality and Feminist Studies. Mishka Banuri. [ Applause, cheering ] Elio Farley. Harper Harper.
Female 3: Go Harper!
Female 2: Lu Mila. Professor Pete Nelson will present the diplomas for the Department of Geography. Colman Bashore. Nora Brown. Liam Smith. Grace Sokolow. Peter Streufert. Yide Xu. Alexandra Zalecki, J. Rowland Illick Prize in Geography. Professor Roman Graf will present the diploma for the Department of German. Peyton Mader. Isaac Mays-Smith. We will now take a minute to change sides. Professor Rebecca Bennett will present the diplomas for the Department of History. Aidan Cornelius. Jianron Ding. Katherine Futterman. Ewan Inglis. Lindsey Ingrey. Luke Jaspan. Ulysses Kamps. Anabelle Lapp. Meaghan McEnroe. Margaret Reynolds, recipient of the Marci J. Stewart Class of ‘72 Memorial Award. Oliver Rourke. Shayiq Ahmed Shah. Margaret Shelburne, recipient of the William B. Catton Prize and the Katznack Family Award. Professor John McLeod will present the diplomas for the Department of History of Art and Architecture, Architectural Studies. Matthew Burns. Tanya Chen. Christopher Fridlington. Naomi Gordon. Adayliah Ley. Eiley Mulkern. Sarah Rifkin. Wyatt Robinson. Charlotte Shapiro. Johan Wichterle. Professor Edward Vazquez will present the diplomas for the Department of History of Art and Architecture, History of Art and Museum Studies. Patricia Hughes. Aine Powers, recipient of the Dr. Edwin Joseph Hamblett Annual Undergraduate French Prize, the Christian A. Johnson Prize for Excellence in History of Art, and the Phi Beta Kappa Prize. Madeline Shean, recipient of the Charles Baker Wright Prize. Jacqueline Tran. Professor Edward Vazquez will present the diploma for the Department of History of Art and Architecture, History of Art. Joseph Hanlon. Professor Grace Spatafora will present the diploma for the Independent Scholar Program. Gabriella Chalker. Professor Michael Sheridan will present the diplomas for the Program in International and Global Studies, African Studies. Jameer Johnson. Professor Elizabeth Morrison will present the diplomas for the Program in International and Global Studies, East Asian Studies. Jonah Joseph. Lindsey Morrow. Professor Rebecca Mitchell will present the diplomas for the Program in International and Global Studies, European Studies. Sasha Leidecker. Benjamin Monnich. Professor Kemi Fuentes-George will present the diplomas for the Program in International and Global Studies, Global Environmental Change. Angela Izi Nkusi. Olivia Kilborn.
Male 5: Olivia!
Female 2: Tashi Sherpa. E. Sonneveldt. Miracle Tapia. Yi-Lan Tseo. Professor Sunder Ramaswamy will present the diplomas for the Program in International and Global Studies, Global Security Studies. Shawn Adams. Sydney Armor, recipient of the J. William Fulbright Foreign Scholarship Board and in the International and Global Studies Award. Julian Bedolis. Ella Bode. Eli Drachman. Demetra Evangelidis. The recipient of the J. William Fulbright Foreign Scholarship Board, Christopher Frago. Camilo Gonzalez-Williamson. Kate Goodman. Reika Herman. Sabrina Salam. Professor Mario Higa will present the diploma for the Program in International and Global Studies, Latin American Studies. Noah Gettings. Professor Sarah Stroup will present the diplomas for the Program in International and Global Studies, migration Studies. Olivia Dixon, recipient of the J. William Fulbright Foreign Scholarship Board. Karina Yzabelle Martir. Amelia Seepersaud.
Male 5: Go Amelia! Professor Rebecca Mitchell will present the diploma for the Program in International and Global Studies, Russian and East European Studies. Colin McKinzie. Professor John Maluccio will present the diplomas for the Program in International Politics and Economics. Andrew Ashley. Anujin Byambasaikhan. Genesis Casillas. Liban Chibssa. Erin Chouinard. Bruno Coelho.
Male 6: Go Bruno! [ Applause, cheering ] Go Bruno! Michael Eller. William Fenimore. Liam Ferry. Claiborne Hartman. Sophia Immorlica. Katya Juarez. Charlotte Lawrence. Alexis Linafelter, recipient of the Senior Honors Thesis Award in International Politics and Economics. Tatum Menon. Olivia Mueller. Brenda Ramirez Alcala. Daniela Roldan Cabrera. Beau Root. Alec Sherman. Jamie Smith. Amarzaya Sonomdagva. Benjamin Taylor. Malick Thiam. Mira Ward. Samuel Wilson. Professor Sandra Carletti will present the diploma for the Department of Italian. Nicholas Paneto. [ Applause, cheering ] Professor Linda White will present the diplomas for the Department of Japanese Studies.
Male 7: Let’s go! [ Cheering, applause ]
Male 8: Go Linda!
Female 2: Federico Gruson. Joel Kofman. Mia Kojima. Haoze Li. Maria Romero. Gabriela Smetana. Andriy Svystun. Professor Luis Castaneda will present the diploma for the Department of Luso-Hispanic Studies. The diplomas. Ana Damaris Neaves. Joseph Duran. Professor Steve Abbott will present the diplomas for the Department of Mathematics and Statistics. Mathematics. Christopher Branch. Peter Burke. David Byrne. Lillian Cullen. Christopher Donohue. Natalie Dwyer-Frattalone, who’s the recipient of the Barbara Buchanan’s 62 Memorial Award. Henry Friedman. Xiuyuan Ge. Ai Hattori, recipient of the Dr. Francis D. Parker, Class of ‘39 Mathematics Prize. Steven Jin. Duncan Kreps. [ Shouting, cheering ] Julia Levin. Bethany Lucey. Cody Mattice. Shay Soodak. Abigail Truex. Odin Woitek. Professor Alex Lyford will present the diploma for the Department of Mathematics and Statistics. Louise Hay. Professor Grace Spatafora will present the diplomas for the program in Molecular Biology and Biochemistry. Jeffrey Bolnick. Chloe Butzel. Isabella Conaty. Alexis Cramer. Victor Esteshe. James Flaumenhaft, recipient of the Molecular Biology and Biochemistry Senior Award. Megan Fox. Sophia Giliberto, recipient of the Molecular Biology and Biochemistry Senior Award. Amelia Grosskopf, recipient of the Janet C. Curry ‘49 Award in the Biological Sciences. Gena Huang. Julia Johnson. Madison Lieblein. Michelle Louie, recipient of the Deborah Parton Class of ‘76 Memorial Award. Benjamin Mertz. William Nemeth. Christopher O’Connell. Professor Damascus Kafumbe will present the diploma for the Department of Music. Julia Ulsh. Professor Clarissa Parker will present the diplomas for the program in Neuroscience. Abdul Abbas. Abshir Adam. Margaret Allen. Audrey Anigbo. Frida Arroyo Delgado. Aurora Austin. Maya Bardorf. Maximillian Bluhm. Eliza Bradford. Victoria Curtis. Ciara Dale. Ella Du.
Male 9: Go Ella!
Female 2: Margaux Eller. Alnaw Elnaw. Dominic Frerichs. Mia Giaever. Trustee Graham Goldsmith, Class of ‘89, will help present the diploma to his daughter. Is Graham here? No? Okay. Marguerite Goldsmith. Oh, he’s here. Oh, he is here. Okay. [ Laughter ] [ Applause, cheering ] Stacey Grimaldo-Garcia. Raymond Grocela. Nicole Grullon. Ugo Iroh. Carter Joyce. Sarah Kimmel. Fiyinfoluwa Kolawole. Katherine Kraczowsky, recipient of the Hazeltine-Klevenow Memorial Trophy. Kian Lalji. Jenny Legido. Charlotte Luster. Marina Lyon. Grace McDevitt. Breanna Bakare Moitt.
Male 10: Go Bakare!
Female 2: Thalia Myers-Cohen. Omar Nemr. Pearl Obeng-Sefah. Sachin Patel. Daniel Ramirez. Samantha Remis. Samia Sami, recipient of the Andrea Olsen Prize in Dance and Interdisciplinary Studies. Tristan Tanchanco, recipient of the Rosalind Lieberman Reese Memorial Award. Dorothea Volpp. Winnie Wang. Sharom Yallico Mendoza. Professor Heidi Grasswick will present the diplomas for the Department of Philosophy. Christopher Echeveste. Finn Helgesen. Lea Hohenlohe, John T. Andrews Memorial Prize in Philosophy, Julian E. and Melba Jarrett Prize. Cheryl Liu. Chang Ma, Michael Moss ‘16 Prize in Buddhist Studies. Olivia Reposa. Professor Anne Goodsell will present the diplomas for the Department of Physics. Jewel Ashbrook, Charles B. Allen ‘62 Memorial Prize, National Science Foundation Graduate Research Fellowship. Ranulph Brown. Julian Calder. Masrur Chowdhurry. Ethan Fleming. Alec Gironda. Mathieu Houlier. Chandra Panjiyar. Elizabeth Suit, J. William Fulbright Foreign Scholarship Board, Robert K. Gould Prize in Physics. Hazel Traw. Ethan Tyler. Hyuma Umeda.
Male 11: Let’s go Hyuma!
Female 2: Gabriella Walsh. Finn Wimberly. Mingqi Zhong. Professor Amy Yuen will present the diplomas for the Department of Political Science. Seth Brown. Alexandra Bryant. Fengqing Chu. Lamine Cisse. Stephanie Crocker. Gabrielle Cywinski. Eva Finney. Senna Gardner. Johnny Gaston. Kemal Gaye. Caroline — no. Ryan Heinzerling. Jake Huggins. Catherine Laura Kish, Timothy Loring Prize in Chinese Language and Culture, Harry S. Truman Scholarship.
Male 12: Go Catherine!
Female 2: Jonah Landsman, John M. and Eleanor Lee Grotzinger Award. Charles Lang. Stuart Lockwood. Matthew Manahan. Kyra McNerney, Katharina Kraus Prize in Political Science. Jose Mena.
Male 13: Let’s go in!
Female 2: Joong Hyun Park. Audrey Peiker. Quinn Pidgeon. Ashley Raynor. Agnes Roche, Stephen A. Freeman Memorial Prize. Aidan Scible, sorry. Caroline Segal. Claire Shannon-Vermillion, Vaznik Family Award. Professor Kim Cronise will present the diplomas for the Department of Psychology. Jack Clarner. Nicholas Floe. Po Lam Fung. Alice Ganey. Christopher Garbe. Sarah Guest. Lauren Calyssa Ho. Sadie LeStage. Sherley Lopez Estrada. [ Cheering, applause ] Ryan McNerney. Awa-Victoria Morel. Sophie Oberdiek. Julia Pepper. Trustee Susan Scher ‘86 will present the diploma to her daughter, Skyler Pierce-Scher. [ Applause, cheering ] Frederica Ravix. Emily Ribeiro. Emma Salem. Ava Steinle. Leonardo Urena. Hailey Vandenbosch. Professor James Calvin will present the diplomas for the Department of Religion. Sophie Ashworth. Peter Herman. Marissa Lewis-Chin, the Woolsey Prizes in the Study of Sacred Texts. Cassandra Traver. Joseph Wilson. Professor Tatiana Smorodinska will present the diplomas for the Department of Russian. Gino Abrams, Alexandra T. and Robert L. Baker Award for Excellence in Russian Language and Literature. Willow Stone. Professor Chong-suk Han will present the diploma for the Department of Sociology. Miles Asare. Sherlyn Castro Ortiz. Jocelyn Flores. Rowan Heffelfinger. Sophia Hwang. Spencer Messier. Antonia Park. Katherine Ryan. Hanwen Zhang, Lang Prize in Sociology. Professor Hedya Klein will present the diplomas for the Department of Studio Art. Rose Aranda Vilcapoma. Francine Newman. Professor Claudio Medeiros will present the diplomas for the Department of Theater. Caroline Armour. Brianna Beach, Marie Lafferty-Cortell Theater Award. Maggie Blake. Kristen Morgenstern, Maud Violet Graybar American History Prize. Karen Newton. Mike Wilson Trophy. And here comes our last graduate. Give it up for Katelyn Wenkoff. [ Cheering, applause ] Congratulations, graduates! [ Applause ]
Male 3: This concludes the awarding of degrees earned at Middlebury College. Congratulations to the Class of 2024. [ Applause ]
Female 2: Excuse me, I’d like to have President Patton, Jeremy Ward, and Dean Ralph come center stage to present canes to our newly tenured faculty. It has become our custom to present canes to faculty members who are awarded tenure this academic year, signifying their honorary membership in this year’s class with your class. President Patton, Vice President of Academic Affairs Jeremy Ward, and Dean of Faculty Jim Ralph, please come present these canes. The following faculty received their tenure this year. Kristin Bright, anthropology. [ Cheering, applause ] [ Laughter ]
Laurie Patton: Keep going with the names.
Female 2: Okay. Either way. Erin Eggleston, biology. [ Cheering, applause ] Joseph Holler, geography, who’s unable to be with us, but — [ Applause ] Laurel Jenkins, dance. [ Cheering, applause ] Shelby Kimmel, computer science. [ Cheering, applause ] Michael Linderman, computer science. [ Cheering, applause ] Jessica LaRose, geography. [ Cheering, applause ] And Gary Winslett, political science, unable to attend. [ Cheering, applause ] [ Background chatter ] [ Cheering ] [ Applause ] It has become our custom to also present canes to faculty members who are awarded — oh, sorry, missing along. I invite Board Chair Ted Truscott back to the podium. Thank you, Michelle. As many of you know, our president and my friend, Lori Patton, announced this spring that she will be living Middlebury at the conclusion of the calendar year. When she will become the president of the prestigious American Academy of Arts and Sciences in Cambridge, Massachusetts. [ Applause ] This is such an extraordinary honor for Laurie and for Middlebury. And while we will miss her dearly, we are so excited for her to have this opportunity. Our students have also noted with some delight, I might add, that Lori has fibbed herself and should become an unofficial member of the class of ‘24.5. I will remind Laurie, however, at our 35th reunion, she was indoctrinated into the class of ‘83 as an honorary member as well. So I think both of those sounds appropriate. Laurie can make her choice. And while we have plenty of time in the coming months to thoroughly celebrate Lori’s myriad of accomplishments, I would like to acknowledge today Laurie is presiding over her final undergraduate commencement exercise at the college. With this in mind, I’d like to make a very special presentation. At each commencement, as we have just witnessed, our new graduates and newly tenured faculty members are presented with a walking stick. A replica for our founder’s cane, which he bequeathed to the college along with the vast majority of his estate. Gamaliel Painter’s original cane is kept in the president’s office. And for decades now, it has been carried by the president in official ceremonies, serving as the institution’s cane. Laurie has spoken of what this symbol means to Middlebury. Explaining how an artifact of the past remains relevant in an institution’s continuing evolution. And she has noted how a later verse in the song “Gamaliel Painter’s Cane” states that our founder left to us his courage in his cane. This courage has sustained Middlebury for centuries. And I’d like to note that this courage has been demonstrated in abundance during the past decade by our 17th president. So when Laurie begins to pack up her office later this year, she will need to leave behind this symbol of Middlebury’s strength and its courage. But she will not be leaving empty-handed. Laurie, it gives me great pleasure to present you with your own replica of Gamaliel Painter’s cane. Which is intended to serve as a tangible reminder of a place where you made your own historical mark, serving with distinction and courage. Congratulations, Laurie. [ Applause ]
Laurie Patton: I get my own cane.
Male 3: You do. And your own set of glasses as well. [ Applause ]
Laurie Patton: Thank you. Thank you.
Male 3: Feel free to say a few words if you want.
Laurie Patton: Thank you. [ Applause ] Thank you so much, Ted, and everyone here. This is an unexpected moment for all of us, and I think we’re all still processing. The academy’s mission of strengthening American democracy through the cultivation of thought leadership is core to my life’s work. And I bring to that all that Middlebury has taught me about that mission in the work ahead. I hope to make you proud. We have seven months to work together to continue to build Middlebury. And one of the greatest things to ask when you leave a place — and I hope everyone is asking it today to themselves, is how am I different? How has this place changed me? I will continue to ask that question. Right now, my heart is filled with gratitude for all that Middlebury has shaped in mind, heart, body, and soul. For Middlebury families, all of you out there, I have learned from you the nature of support from near and far. Even when you don’t understand what your college student is doing, you love and listen to them anyway. Thank you for being that collective genius. For Middlebury trustees, I have learned the extraordinary power of faithful, trusting argument. You have embodied the ideal that I spoke about in 2015 of more and better arguments, with greater respect, stronger resilience, and deeper wisdom. From Middlebury staff, I have learned the pride of place and the work that goes into cultivating our local world. Thank you for nurturing a place of beauty. From Middlebury faculty, I have learned an exquisite combination of compassion and pedagogical excellence. Thank you for reminding us every day of rigor, freedom, and generosity. From Middlebury and Addison neighbors in the town and county, you have taught me about everyday practices of democracy that I believe will save our nation. Thank you for those lessons in the power of community life. One of my ancient teachers, Rabbi Tarfon, from the Jewish tradition says, “You may not finish the work yourselves. But neither are you permitted to cease from it.” And that is for all of us, and particularly for beloved Middlebury students. Yes, I agree. I fibbed myself. You have taught me creativity and perseverance, even and perhaps especially when the world is on fire. I will end my thanks to you, our students, by sharing again with you the final sentences that I shared with you yesterday. You are people of the eclipse, and that clamor today that you hear is not only celebrating your journey from a dark, viral Corona in 2020, to a blazing solar Corona in 2024 in April. It is also celebrating who you will become. As people of the eclipse, you will hear many times in your life a sudden hush when hope seems to vanish. As Middlebury people, you have proven over and over again that you have the strength to persevere beyond that sudden hush, beyond that unexplained darkness. And stand witness to the next moment, the moment of hope, when you embrace again that brilliant flash of promise. We need thousands of you to gather in fields and be citizen scientists, to start new festivals. To greet strangers as you do today and as you did on April 8th, on the blanket across the path. Go now and bring Middlebury into the world with your faces upturned in hope, with your mind, your spirit, your body, and your hearts, you have the power to help and heal. The same thing ancient peoples longed for. You will never be strangers to moments of unexpected and inexplicable darkness. You’ve already lived them. And you will have the wisdom like all people of the eclipse do, to stay, and wait, and watch. And then in the bigness of your hearts, you will know how to embrace that thin sliver of light reemerging. You will describe it, you will study it, you will film it, you will measure it, you will sing it, you will tell new stories. Because you are Middlebury. People of the eclipse, we know that you will carry us through the darkness and show us again how to sustain and light the world. My eternal gratitude. [ Applause ]
Female 2: At this time, to remind the graduates that they go forward from Middlebury, as well with the strength and character of the college, symbolized by the replica of the cane. We will sing “Gamaliel Painter’s Cane.” The song was first sung 107 years ago at the commencement luncheon in June 2017. As with the student address, we restored this song to commencement celebration in 2000, our bicentennial year. The text of the song may be found on page 39 of your program. I invite Catherine Kish of the Class of 2024 — [ Cheering ] — yes, to join us on stage. Catherine will sing the verse and the chorus through once, and then we will all join in singing it through a second time. Graduates, please, and now Laurie as well, make sure you tap your canes when we sing, rap, rap, rap. Please rise as you are able. [ Music ]
Catherine Kish: [Singing] When Gamaliel Painter died. He was Middlebury’s pride. A sturdy pioneer without a stain. And he left his all by will. To the college on the hill. And included in a codicil cane. Oh, its rap, rap, rap, and it’s tap, tap, tap. If you listen you can hear it sounding plain. For a helper true and tried. As the generations glide. There is nothing like Gamaliel Painter’s cane. When Gamaliel Painter died. He was Middlebury’s pride. A sturdy pioneer without a stain. And he left his all by will. To the college on the hill. And included in the codicil cane. Oh, its rap, rap, rap, and it’s tap, tap, tap. If you listen you can hear it sounding plain. For a helper true and tried, as the generations glide. There is nothing like Gamaliel Painter’s cane. [ Cheering ] [ Applause ]
Female 2: Please remain standing as you are, if able. Muslim Chaplain Zahra Moeini Meybodi will now give the benediction, followed by a closing prayer by Jesse Bruchac of the Nulhegan Band of Konak Abenaki Nation and the Director of the School of Abenaki. To conclude our ceremony today, Catherine will lead us in singing all three verses of the Alma Mater. The lyrics may be found, again, on Page 39 of your program, with two options for the chorus.
Zahra Moeini Meybodi: The seed of knowledge is the heart. This is a teaching that is central to the many faiths and wisdom traditions present amongst us today. Especially in my own faith, Islam. Centering the heart as the organ of knowledge has profound ramifications for what we understand educational achievement itself to be. It takes it beyond the books, the papers, the texts, and plants it into the world, and most profoundly, into our character. As we celebrate your hard-earned degrees today, may you also continue to ascend to the unconditional degrees present in your heart. The heart that can be a source of hope for others. The one that uncovers beauty in struggles. The one that finds love while waiting. The one that is awed by truth-seeking. That is joyful in standing against indifference. And most importantly, the one that can’t truly be itself without being kind. Especially towards those who are oppressed and most vulnerable. May your hearts be forever polished, and may your hearts be forever flourishing. [ Foreign language ]
Jesse Bruchac: I congratulate you all. May your knowledge lead you to a peaceful and honest life filled with love and compassion for others. Honor those who have come before you, and those yet to come. Acknowledge that all desire a good life, so that your days will be long, and the summer will always be near. [ Foreign language ] With each new day, be thankful for the opportunities it brings you, and like the sun, become the light in the world. Let your light shine before others so that they will see and be inspired by your good deeds everywhere. [ Foreign language ] [ Music ] [ Singing ] [ Cheering, applause ]
Female 2: Thank you so much, Catherine. And congratulations Middlebury College, Class of 2024! [ Cheering, applause ] [ Applause ] [ Cheering, music ] [ Music ]
2024 Middlebury College Baccalaureate Service
[ Music ]
Mark R. Orten: We pause to acknowledge that Middlebury College sits on land which has served as a site of meeting and exchange among Indigenous peoples since time immemorial. The Western Abenaki are the traditional caretakers of these Vermont lands and waters, which they call Ndakinna, or “homeland.” We remember their connection to this region and the hardships they continue to endure. Let us take a moment of silence to pay respect to the Abenaki elders and to the Indigenous inhabitants of Turtle Island, past and present. [ Silence ] We give thanks for the opportunity to share in the bounty of this place and to protect it. We are all one in the sacred web of life that connects people, animals, plants, air, water, and earth. Now let us join in the spirit of invocation. Let us be still for a moment and come to our full senses, setting aside all that it took to get us here and all that we plan to do after. And just for this moment, notice our glorious setting, the growing energies of pomp and circumstance all around, the feelings of pride and joy and relief mingled, albeit for some, also with anxiety or even dread. But underlying it all, accomplishment, just here, just now, just this. Infinite now, dawn upon us in this baccalaureate moment of our weekend of celebration as we bear witness to the miraculousness of this day. Infinite wisdom and inscrutable mystery inspire us with any and all that is divine to make this sacred moment of our togetherness a humble affirmation of achievement, of knowledge, of familial love, and collegial kinship, a personal perseverance, and the experience of learning. Bring to us and to the Class of 2024 an informed compassion, an educated commitment to the right and the true and the good. Amin, amén, and amen. Blessed be these proceedings. [ Silence ]
Jesse Bowman Bruchac: [Foreign language] I congratulate you all. [ Foreign language spoken ] May your knowledge lead you to a peaceful and honest life filled with love and compassion for others. Honor those who have come before you and those yet to come. Acknowledge that all desire a good life so that your days will be long, and summer will always be near. [ Silence ]
Laurie L. Patton: Good afternoon, and welcome to our Baccalaureate Service. Historically, baccalaureate services provide an opportunity to reflect on the meaning of an undergraduate education in the liberal arts and sciences tradition. Hence, this is an event of a very traditional nature. As we move through the rituals and traditions of today’s service, I invite you all to also remember the particular circumstances, the unique circumstances that bring us all here together today. Four years ago, give or take a few months, whether you began in September or February, you gathered in this space to mark the beginning of your college education. However, you weren’t really in this space. You were virtual. And you may or may not have remembered the words of wisdom that we shared with you. I’m going to say more about that a little bit later. We were trying to be together, begin together. And that, too, was an auspicious occasion. So is this, even more so because we are now physically gathered together. Not only have you completed your degree requirements, but you have done it largely in the company of the people in this chapel, sometimes, people you only knew remotely and now you know as they sit nearby, physically present to you. Your classmates, your roommates, your teammates, your fellow artists, a chapel full of those whom you only knew by distance, by Zoom, have become a chapel full of friends. You are the artisans of friendship that is so much a part of Middlebury. You are here together as you could not be during those days. That part of education that happened between you and among you, that sacred art of friendship, you built relationships that don’t appear on your transcripts. But those relationships are vital. They are the life givers to what you learned at Middlebury, perhaps the most essential element of your education and an important part of what you will take with you in your hearts when you leave us tomorrow. As part of what is in our hearts today, we want to invoke our gratitude for Dean Mark Orten and Jeff Buettner for organizing this service. I also want to extend our gratitude to those who were responsible for this afternoon’s music. George Matthew, the college Carillonneur, Jesse Bruchac and his beautiful native flute, and the Middlebury College Choir. You will be hearing the words of wisdom that we start our classes with every time they begin with us. You are going to be hearing them again today. Reflect on them four years later more deeply, more compassionately, and keep them in your hearts. [ Silence ] [ Foreign language spoken ]
Female 1: Happy is the person who finds wisdom, the person who attains understanding. Her value in trade is better than silver, her yield greater than gold. She is more precious than rubies. All of your goods cannot equal her. In her right hand is length of days. In her left, riches and honor. Her ways are pleasant ways and all her paths peaceful. She is a tree of life to those who grasp her, and whoever holds on to her is happy. The Lord founded this Earth by wisdom. God established the heavens by understanding. By their knowledge, the depths burst apart, and the skies distilled dew. [ Silence ] [ Singing in foreign language ]
Female 2: In this world, there is no purifier like wisdom. In time, one who is once self-perfected by yoga finds that wisdom in the self. With wisdom as the highest goal, controlling the senses and filled with trust, one reaches wisdom. There, with wisdom reached, one goes quickly to the highest place. [ Silence ] [ Foreign language spoken ] [ Flute music playing ] [ Applause ] [ Silence ] [ Foreign language spoken ]
Female 3: Who among you are wise and understanding whether good manner of life, let them demonstrate their deeds and wisdom’s meekness. But if you have bitter jealousy and selfish ambition in hearts, do not boast and lie against the truth. This is not the wisdom that comes down from above, the one that is Earth-bound and spiritual demonic. For where there is jealousy and selfish ambition there is disorder in every kind of mean practice. But the wisdom from above is, first of all, pure. Then it is peaceable, gentle, open to persuasion. It is filled with mercy and with good fruits. It is not divided. It is not insincere. But the fruit that is righteousness is found in peace by the makers of peace. [ Silence ] [ Singing in foreign language ]
Male 1: You who believe, give charitably from the good things you have acquired and that we have produced for you from the earth. Do not give away the bad things that you yourself would only accept with your eyes closed. Remember that God is self-sufficient, worthy of all praise. Satan threatens you with the prospect of poverty and commands you to do foul deeds. God promises you His forgiveness and His abundance. God is limitless and all-knowing, and He gives wisdom to whomever He will. Whoever is given wisdom has truly been given much good, but only those with insight bear this in mind. [ Silence ] [ Music ] [ Applause ] [ Silence ] [ Foreign language spoken ]
Female 4: When students today fail to make progress, where is the fault? The fault lies in the fact that they don’t have faith in themselves. If you don’t have faith in yourself, then you’ll be forever in a hurry, trying to keep up with everything around you. You’ll be twisted and turned by whatever environment you’re in, and you can never move freely. But if you can just stop this mind that goes rushing around, moment by moment, looking for something, you’ll be no different from the patriarchs and Buddhas. [ Silence ]
Female 5: I want to talk about dreaming. Not the activity of the sleeping brain, but rather the activity of an awake and alert one, not idle, wishful speculation, but engaged, directed, daytime vision, about entrance into another space, someone else’s situation, sphere, projection if you like. By dreaming, the cell permits intimacy without the risk of being the other. And this intimacy that comes from pointed imagining should precede all of our decision-making, all of our cause-mongering, and our actions. We’re in a mess, you know, and we have got to get out. We should visualize, imagine, dream up, and enter the other before we presume to solve the problems of ours. We might as well dream the world as it ought to be. [ Silence ] [ Music ] [ Applause ] [ Silence ]
Laurie L. Patton: This is a poignant moment for me, as it is unexpectedly my last Baccalaureate with you all. And so that is something I share with you. In a way, we are graduating together, and we are thinking about how Middlebury will take shape in our memories. But let me describe for you now, as I have on many other occasions, the way you have shaped Middlebury. As I look at all that you have done since you began here, there is no doubt in my mind that you are fully prepared to take life on. Here are some numbers: five Fulbright winners, two NSF Graduate Research Fellows, an Udall Scholar, a Truman Scholar, a Goldwater Scholar, a Holling Scholar, two Critical Language Scholars, and two Gilman Scholars. A hundred and fifty-five of you were spring student symposium presenters, 90 were summer research assistants, 53 of you were peer tutors, 26 of you are senior peer writing tutors, not only providing tutoring to thousands over their collective years of work, but you’ve been mentors and researchers and trainers in writing pedagogy. You are varsity athletes that have been part of 18 NESCAC championship teams, and let’s go for those women tomorrow, and seven NCAA championship teams. Eight of you are All-Americans, three of you are CSC Academic All-Americans, one of you is an NCAA Elite 90 winner, and two of you are NESCAC championship relay winners. And many others of you participate in club sports, from crew to rugby to ultimate to water polo, perhaps with less recognition on the national stage, but with no less passion and pride. And there’s what you have accomplished as individuals and in small groups. You have been college access mentors, helping Mid Union High School students navigate the college process, language and motion volunteers, helping to support global awareness and curiosity and intercultural competence, helping making sure folks could even get to their high schools. You have been sustainable solutions lab workers. You’ve established the EcoReps program. And you have been helping sustainable practices throughout all of Middlebury. You have rewilded 300 acres of our campus grounds and connected to the Knoll. You have collaborated with International Christian University as an international translation team, extending the stories and testimonials of Japanese Americans incarcerated as a result of World War II. And you have extended this work in the Go For Broke Torchbearers program. You served in over 38 community leadership roles during your Mid years. You established Civics in Action, that fosters civic engagement and participation in policy and governance. You led our alternative break programs. You completed privilege and poverty summer internships. You received cross-cultural community engagement grants to create partnerships for the common good, including a Conservation Heritage-Turambe in Rwanda and Turtle and Coastal Conservation Assistance and Education in Zanzibar. And you challenged us to be a better Middlebury community, to be better about isolation protocols, to be better about responding to wars, to be better about environmental justice as part of our Energy 2028 plan, and to engage with you as you protested. That is who you are. You may know that I also think about the essential character of particular classes when I have addressed them at Baccalaureate. I have even given them names. The Feb ‘23 Class were dancers, people who had pivoted so much in response to difficult circumstances that they had become dancers. The May Class of 2022 I called recovery artists, people who knew what kind of community it took to survive through COVID and then to rebuild as all communities do through COVID. The June Class of 2023, last year, were people emerging from the isolation. So what would I say of you, 2024? It’s super clear. You are the people of the eclipse. [ Audience laughter ] You are people who have known unexpected, even inexplicable darkness and then have found ways to emerge back into the light. You know this in your bones, but it bears repeating that your entire high school graduation was eclipsed by the pandemic. I am so happy that you are going to have one here. [ Applause ] Keeping that joy in your heart, remember four years ago? You came to us sort of in the usual schlep from the train station or the airport or the drive-through up to Battell or Stewart, waiting in cars behind other families, managing siblings and dogs and the need for lunch. Nope, you came to us through the Virtue Field House with masks. You greeted me and other administrators with a shared knowledge that it was nothing short of a miracle that we were opening and that you were going to college. We handed you a big bag of groceries for your period of isolation and wished you well during that time so that you could come back, test negative, and make sure all was well for you to pursue your classes. At your virtual Baccalaureate in 2020, we also reminded you, in that strange season, that you should have a mug. We asked you to think of it as a talisman for all that Mid had to offer, even in a pandemic. Many of you tell us that you still have it and keep it today. As Mark Orten asked you to do then, you have kept it as a reminder of learning and teaching that has been part of your experience. You saw us that semester making rounds in the middle of the night. You had to curb your natural instincts to meet friends in large gatherings. Your capacity to learn spontaneously in and out of the classroom was eclipsed. Your capacity to play sports was eclipsed. Your capacity to be artistic, to dance and paint and act with others, everything but your love of learning and your determination was in sudden darkness. And you told us in the middle of the year that what you longed for most was spontaneous gathering. So we created a way with a whole bunch of predetermined rules and structures to create spontaneous gathering. You were the ones who learned to silent disco dance on Battell Beach as a way of signaling to your classmates that you were there for them. You figured out a way to be with your teammates even though you didn’t play for almost two years. Then, in those middle years, the restrictions eased. And your last two years of college were a lot more like, quote-unquote, “normal college.” But, of course, there was no return to normalcy. Instead, there were new forms of learning, new forms of social interaction, of having conversations. There were new kinds of exploring, suddenly, when you’re free to move around. But you carried the memories of what you endured. You carried powerful memories of all the losses. And what has been eclipsed will shape you and your imaginations long after you have left this place. That’s the dark side of the eclipse. That’s the darkness that people don’t expect, and that people have feared, humans have feared, for millennia. An eclipse suggests that the darkness will never go away. Ancient people told stories and performed rituals during eclipses to give voice to their experience that the reverse of the natural order was happening. In ancient China, people banged on drums and cymbals because they believed that a dragon was eating the sun. A similar version of that belief existed in India and Peru and parts of Southeast Asia that something demonic was consuming the sun. Ancient Armenians imagined a black planet. In Togo and Benin, the sun and moon were thought to be fighting. And people performed those rituals and chants to get them to stop their battling. I am sure that many of you have felt that way. Whether it was in the dark hours of COVID isolation or the equally demoralizing hours of watching the destruction and civilian casualties in Ukraine, in Israel, and Gaza, or working on an adequate response to climate change when the challenge just felt too big, too impossible and the world not responsive enough to the dire need. You may have felt like something dark was consuming all the light, all the possibility. And you’d do anything to make it go away, to get the sun and the moon to stop fighting. Those who lived in the ancient world felt like you did too. Some Native American peoples felt that the sun had lost its capacity to give light. And the best way to light the sun’s fire again was by sending burning arrows into the sky toward the sun. Ancient Japanese people created bonfires and made large displays of shining jewels to restore the sun to its original luster. During eclipses, people have wanted to give the world back its light. In all that you have done, you, too, have wanted to give the world back its light. We know now that the sun emerges and that an eclipse is nothing short of a miracle if you get to witness it. The gathering of millions across America to watch the eclipse on April 8th was a joyful, awe-inspiring moment. The gathering of Middlebury students, faculty, staff, and neighbors on Battell Beach was even more awe-inspiring. Of course, it was only natural that Middlebury was in the marvelously named path of totality. Let me share the thoughts of eminent journalists and your professors, Bill McKibben and Sue Halpern, as they reported from Middlebury for the New Yorker Eclipse Diaries. A college turns out to be a good place to watch an eclipse. Most of the student body, released from classes, assembled on the lawn around 2:15 p.m., waiting for something to happen. An astrophysicist set up a pinhole camera. A specialist in spacecraft propulsion was taking 10-second, time-lapse images. But when the sun went dark at 3:27 p.m., thought seemed to cease to exist. The students who had been playing frisbee and volleyball fell silent. And when the light came back 55 seconds later, a loud rolling clamor broke across the field. The sun had returned, and all throughout, before and after the darkness, there was a veritable carnival of science and humanities and social sciences and arts on Battell Beach with everyone gathering, with citizen scientists everywhere. In fact, someone told me recently about a project that reminded me of this scene and reminded me of you. It fits you, Middlebury students, perfectly. It’s called SunSketchers. And it facilitates the participation of potentially millions of regular folks to gather virtually and contribute to cosmological knowledge, nothing less than the measurement of the sun. As SunSketcher’s founder states, SunSketcher is an app anyone can use to photograph a solar eclipse. First used on April 8th, we’re now counting down to the next one, August 12th, in 2026. Mass participation will create an incredible database of images that, when analyzed together, could allow scientists to map the sun. We don’t know the shape of the sun? you ask. Nope. Well, not exactly. Scientists have a pretty good idea. But it’s not nearly as precise as it could be. We’re going to change that, measuring the sun’s oblateness to an accuracy of a few parts in a million. This offers an unprecedented opportunity to measure the sun’s shape and, therefore, infer its inner structure. The SunSketcher project will use smartphone observations by citizen scientists situated along the 2,000-mile-long eclipse path from Texas to Maine to reveal that precise shape of the solar disk. The SunSketchers, then, are, to me, much like the people laughing and cheering and providing eclipse education on Battell Beach. SunSketchers are volunteers from the general public. They are all everyday contributors, and in that way, they are also akin to Middlebury’s educational mission. SunSketchers want to involve as large and diverse a group as possible, where every observation will make a valuable contribution to the project. In other words, SunSketchers are measuring the sun, yes, but they are also building hope through building knowledge — building hope through building knowledge, one photograph, one person at a time like you have done at Middlebury. I saw it in your posters in the Undergraduate Research Symposium. I heard it in your account of your summer internships when you returned to us every fall. There was a sense of possibility in your eyes and voices. This hope is not sentimental. It is clear and determined. The kind of hope reflected in Cherokee poet Linda Neal Reising’s prize-winning poem written for the April 8th eclipse. And you have it in your program if you would like to read along. The Reason We Gather for the Solar Eclipse: “It is not because the light pinholes through oak leaves, creating a circus of crescent suns upon the lawn — performers in spangled costumes. It is not to feel the day lose its way, the waning of warmth sending icing fingers to stroke our prickled arms. It is not to see the scenery’s color seeping away to sepia, like a tin-type photograph of unremembered ancestors. It is not hearing the sudden hush of songbirds rushing to roost among the limbs of shadowed pines. It is not observing orb-weaving spiders dismantling their webs, stowing them like returned sailors’ rigging. It is not to keep a date with Venus, spreading her goddess glow, outshining the stars, startled by their daytime awakening. It is not to share the wealth of Bailey’s beads, strung around the Moon or the golden corona crowning the royal Sun. No, we gather for that moment, after totality’s darkness, when we stand, faces upturned, waiting for that brilliant flash of promise, and we think, Ah, yes, this is the way it will be.” Reising describes a world where all the tiny responses to darkness, the spiders putting away their webs, and the birds’ sudden hush are themselves eclipsed by the sun’s return. And that is your story too. You started a college fighting a corona, a virus in the shape of a crown. You ended up by embracing a corona, the outside of the sun, visible in crown-like perfection. You are graduating into a world where all of you will need to be citizen scientists. All of you will need to be SunSketchers. But you are Middlebury, so you already are. As Toni Morrison puts it in your Book of Wisdom, you are already dreaming the world the way it ought to be. Or, as Reising puts it, you will need to think and are already thinking with determination and knowledge and compassion. “Ah, yes, this is the way it will be.” So before you leave us to do that work, you will gather one more time this weekend in hope and celebration. Bill McKibben and Sue Halpern wrote about how, as the sun reemerged from the April 8th eclipse, a loud rolling clamor broke across the field. And tomorrow another kind of loud rolling clamor will break across our fields, your friends and loved ones cheering you on. That clamor is not only celebrating your journey from a dark viral corona in 2020 to a blazing solar one in 2024, it is also celebrating who you will become. As people of the eclipse, as SunSketchers, you will hear many times in your life that sudden hush when hope seems to vanish. But as Middlebury people, you have proven over and over again that you have the strength to persevere beyond that sudden hush, beyond that unexplained darkness and stand witness to the next moment, the moment of hope, when you embrace again that brilliant flash of promise. We need thousands of you to gather in fields and be citizen scientists, to start new festivals, to greet strangers as you did on April 8th on the blanket across the path. So go now and bring Middlebury into the world with your faces upturned in hope. With your mind, your body, your spirit, and your hearts — [ Silence ] — you have the power to help and to heal, the same things that ancient peoples longed for as they shot arrows of fire at the sun and begged the celestial bodies to make peace. You will never be strangers to moments of unexpected and inexplicable darkness. You’ve already lived them. And you will have the wisdom, like all SunSketchers do, to stay and to wait and to watch. And then, in the bigness of your hearts, you know how to embrace that thin sliver of light reemerging. You will describe it. You will study it. You will film it. You will measure it. You will sing it. You will tell new stories because you are Middlebury, people of the eclipse. We know that you will carry us through darkness and show us again how to sustain and light the world. Congratulations. [ Applause ] [ Silence ] [ Music ] [ Silence ] [ Applause ] [ Silence ] [ Foreign language spoken ]
Jesse Bowman Bruchac: With each new day, be thankful for the opportunities it offers you. And, like the sun, become the light of the world. Let your light shine before others so that they will be inspired by your good deeds everywhere. [Foreign language] [ Applause ] [ Music ]
Middlebury College Commencement Address: Dan Schulman '80
Coming soon.