Welcome and congratulations to the Denison University class of 2015.
It has been an honor to spend two years on the hill with you. I want to thank you for welcoming my family and me to Denison and for helping us transition into the college. I also want to congratulate you on all that you have accomplished during your time here.
We have a performance culture at Denison. We expect people to step up, to participate, and to push themselves to perform both in the classroom and across campus. You have demonstrated that attribute of Denison at its very best. You have been great students, who have performed at the highest level through your courses and through impressive research projects. You have represented Denison at the highest level on athletic fields and in artistic venues. And it has been an honor to work with you through a myriad of campus organizations as you have sought to leave your mark on the college.
You have had the privilege of receiving a special kind of education. It is the kind of education that every person deserves—but few receive. There has been a lot of media coverage about higher education over the last year. Pundits, politicians and others have weighed in on what makes a valuable education. For the most part, they have missed the point. They have focused on the components of an education. While colleges have courses, books, majors, co-curricular activities, and lots of strategic plans, it would be a mistake to reduce them to these parts. At the core, colleges are bundles of people and the relationships that form or don’t form between them. The learning, the fun, the challenge and the growth, all happen as people come together in different configurations, in different times and places, and doing different things together. We learn from each other. We are shaped by the nature of the relationships.
The education you received was formed by the people you interacted with on this hill. Friendships run deep at Denison and in complex ways. Many friendships began and grew because you shared a common passion. You worked together in a lab or played on the same athletic team or performed in an ensemble or choir. And many of the friendships formed because each of you was different, and all of you took joy in that difference. You hailed from different parts of the country, or you had different personalities. A graduating senior recently wrote to me, “I came into Denison with my own set of experiences and beliefs, but through interactions with people who have entirely different experiences and beliefs, I have developed into a more complete person. The people I have met while at Denison have shaped me in a way I could not have imagined four years ago.”
Another kind of relationship that runs deep at Denison is mentorship. I am convinced that one can get a great education many places, but what makes Denison unique is the mentorship. At Denison our faculty go way beyond being great teachers to being master mentors. They listen, challenge, collaborate, show empathy, and exude humor, but most of all, our faculty connect, care and catalyze. One graduating senior recently wrote to me, “The classes that I have been on the verge of dropping, have often been some of my best and most memorable classes. In those classes, the professors challenged me to a level I did not believe I could achieve.” The student went on to state, “I really appreciate the professors who did not accept bad work. The phrase, ‘this is good work, but I know you can do better,’ empowered me to push myself and grow in my four years at Denison.”
We have a culture of mentorship. It happens everywhere. When I ask students to mention important mentors, they never hesitate. While they always start with faculty, they go on to mention staff, peers and other members of our community.
Finally, your education is shaped as we share a physical space, a campus that becomes a community. We have our agreements and we have our disagreements. We have moments of profound conflict. This community is diverse by race, ethnicity, class, sexual orientation and identity, political and religious views and life experiences. People collide in ways that lead to explosive moments. Those clashes are painful because they lead to disagreement, misunderstanding, and colliding needs. They also are important, as a lot of learning and community growth happens through those relationships of conflict. The class of 2015 has regularly taken on the hard issues on campus. You have exhibited intellectual and personal courage and ethical leadership by helping each other to ask hard questions. You have pushed each other to be better people, and you have pushed Denison to be a better college.
An education takes place as people interact with each other. Colleges are bundles of relationships. The relational aspects are what matter most and deserve way more attention, respect and support. The books being written and the public policy being drafted almost never talk about the relationships. Yet, ask alumni who have lived great lives, and that is almost all they talk about.
My hope is simple. I hope the relationships, the social interactions, that formed your Denison experience have instilled within you three attributes:
The first is self-determination. Denison provides a foundation from which students find their voice, becoming the kind of autonomous thinkers the world so desperately needs. The world needs people who can think anew and for themselves. It needs people who can get the questions right.
The second is community. This is a college that produces graduates who are committed to and capable of building and sustaining community in important ways. We produce engaged citizens and discerning moral agents. The challenges you will face will require people who can build healthy teams at work, communities at home, and connections globally. Be those people.
The third is performance. This is a college that produces graduates who seek excellence. We demand it in the classroom, strive for it on athletics fields, in the arts and other campus organizations, and embed it as a value. Live the quality, and role-model it for others. Do not accept mediocrity in thought, values and actions, and demand that others do the same.
As you look forward, I charge you, our graduating seniors, with taking at least these three sets of skills, values and habits from your Denison liberal arts education. They will serve you well. Now that you have a liberal arts education, live a life shaped by the liberal arts.
The great news—the relationships that form at Denison start here and endure for the rest of your life. I love the comment made this week by one of you, “Denison relationships are not transactional, but overlapping and intersecting; something that we will take with us no matter where we go.”
Many of you will remain lifelong friends. Some of you will become lifelong friends, even if you were not friends at Denison. You are graduating into an alumni community of 40,000 Denisonians. You will be surprised at how much Denison and Denisonians provide the relationships that form your life.
As that happens, please stay connected to the college. Come back for your reunions. When you meet interesting people between the ages of 15 and 17, suggest they look at Denison for college. Put a Denison coffee mug on your desk at work, a bumper sticker on your car, and a Denison pennant on your refrigerator at home. You are great people, and we want the world to know that you are Denisonians. Identify yourself so other members of our extended family can do the same.
Continue to be great friends and important mentors to each other. Push each other to be lifelong learners, who produce and consume knowledge as part of your everyday life. Mentor each other to use your liberal arts education to always form views based on logic, reason, and sound thinking.
Push each other to be the ones who always connect seemingly disparate people, helping them find the commonalities and learning to love the differences. Be the people who connect ideas to find new ways of thinking. Be the people who connect ideas to actions, thereby making a difference in the world.
Finally, push and support each other, as you did on this hill, to be people who aspire to excellence in all that you do.
Denison professor Steve Vogel closes his new book by stating, “the world is nothing beyond us but also is nothing above or superior to us: it is something we are in as well as of, and that we make in all of our actions. Our duty is simply to make it together, and to make it well.”
I will miss you. And I look forward to following your journey. This is a great college. You are a great Denison class. And this has been a magnificent year. Congratulations Denison class of 2015.