The following is excerpted from President Hiram Chodosh’s charge to the Class of 2016 during this May’s Commencement ceremony:
…take the things you loved here and recreate them wherever you are.
Turn your apartment building or neighborhood into your campus quad.
Debate and ask the pressing, neutrally-framed questions that attack the false dichotomies and get at the truth.
Reach out to those in need and stand up for your friends.
Write and publish what concerns you.
Empower the center in times of polarization.
Piece together your own at-large Athenaeum in your new cities.
Identify your professors and mentors in your bosses.
Inspire pick-up games, casual runs or swims with your competitive spirit.
Simulate and practice your pitches and presentations.
Consult, invest, research, create, problem-solve just as you did here.
Coach kids and their friends as you were coached.
Volunteer when no one else wants to take the call.
Care, support, mentor, befriend, and cross-identify with the new and different people you meet.
Use your linguistic ability to code, decode, and translate for the world’s towers of Babel.
Put your teamwork into the workplace,
And always put the work of your team first…
…Class of ’16,
When you get out of here tonight, take us with you…
…Turn the losses into wins.
Take what you did here to make a difference out there.
To hear President Chodosh’s entire speech and view the entire Commencement ceremony, visit www.cmc.edu/commencement