As college graduation time approaches

[DawnM]

Do you remember your commencement address?  Do you even remember who spoke at your commencement?  

 

I do remember who spoke at mine and I remember a joke he told, but other than that, I don't remember the main idea of what he said.  We had James Dobson speak.

 

ETA: I did not attend any of my grad program commencements nor do I have any idea who spoke at them.

 

 

[carriede]

Nope. And it's only been 7 years. Not sure I remembered it 7 DAYS after.

[bettyandbob]

27 years ago. I remember who spoke--Roger Mudd. I don't remember what he said. 

 

 

[Kelly1730]

34 years ago and I remember nothing except that we weren't supposed to throw our mortarboards, and we did :ohmy: .

[Gil]

Half of the time, I don't even remember what the teacher said after class...like, right after class. Between 'dismissed' and the door, I can forget whatever it was that the teacher was rambling about. I do know who spoke at the Spring Commencement this year and I remember the tone/message but not the words.

[creekland]

A fair number of moons ago and I don't recall a thing that was said.  I barely remember much of that day - and no - it's not due to alcohol or partying.  It's because I don't really care much for ceremonies.

 

I remember more about my high school graduation than college graduation - but mainly because I didn't want to attend as there was a youth conference at the beach I wanted to go to (NY had late graduations and my school was one of the latest - kids attending military academies always missed graduation).  My parents told me I'd regret skipping graduation, so wouldn't let me skip out on it to get to the conference at its start.  I left the ceremony thinking, "I missed a day of the conference for this?  Why?"

 

I remember far more about all the family vacations we took than I remember about any particular ceremony.  We put far more focus on travel now as a family - and my kids have ALL had trips to celebrate their graduation.  ;)

[Cinder]

No idea who spoke because we didn't attend. (Dh and I were already married.) My parents lived too far away to consider attending. Dh's parents lived only an hour away but said they weren't all that interested in sitting there for hours and that we shouldn't plan to attend just because we thought they'd want us to. They didn't even go to their own graduations. So we figured, why bother, as we weren't too interested in sitting around for hours either. And we didn't really have the extra money to spend on graduation gowns.

[Wildcat]

Nope. No clue. I daydreamed through the whole thing. I only went because I had the pressure of being the first to graduate from a 4-year university and my parents wanted to watch me walk. I would have rather skipped and just gone to dinner.

 

I secretly hope neither of my kids wants to 'walk'. I despise ceremonies.

[almondbutterandjelly]

Yes.  George Bush spoke at mine.  Then the student speaker was a girl from my freshman hall, and she spoke about the mountains being special to her.

[Jenny in Florida]

I didn't go to my ceremony.

 

I graduated mid-year and was entitled to walk in the ceremony in May. But by the time that rolled around, I had already gotten on with my life and had no particular interest in playing dress-up.

 

For what it's worth, I did have some lingering regrets about that decision. So, I strongly encouraged my daughter to go through her commencement, even though she wasn't into it at the time. I told her that, if she found the experience worthless later, she could blame it on me, but if she later regretted not going, she would not be able to go back and fix it.

[JustEm]

I skipped my graduation to watch my cousin test for his 1st degree black sash test in kung fu. Him doing kung fu is the reason I met my dh so it seemed like a more important milestone for me than my own graduation.  No regrets

[redsquirrel]

We had two. The first was a woman and she was a state official from VT (my college was near VT but in NY state) and she talked about environmentalism. It was deadly dull and I stopped listening. I think everyone stopped listening. It was really boring. I felt badly for her because I am sure what she was saying was important, but she was a human sleeping pill. And then there was a second speaker who was a history professor at the school. My class was the 100th graduating class and that called for a bit of celebration. The professor had written a fantastic history of the school that was published for the anniversary. It was a really good book, I promise.

 

Anyway, at the close of the speech he talked about how the best days of the college were to come, blah blah blah and look at some of the notable graduates...and then he started mentioning students by name and mine was one :scared:  I hadn't been listening because the first speaker put me to sleep. So, my mom was thrilled to the point of tears, but I totally missed it. I was daydreaming and then I heard my name said. I thought I was in trouble or something.

[Barbara H]

Yes.  George Bush spoke at mine.  Then the student speaker was a girl from my freshman hall, and she spoke about the mountains being special to her.

 

George Bush at mine too. No girl speaking about the mountains though so I guess we didn't go to the same school. ;-)

[PrincessMommy]

Nope. No clue. I daydreamed through the whole thing. I only went because I had the pressure of being the first to graduate from a 4-year university and my parents wanted to watch me walk. I would have rather skipped and just gone to dinner.

 

I secretly hope neither of my kids wants to 'walk'. I despise ceremonies.

 

So far we haven't had anyone walk.  Thank God!  I have one who claims she's going to walk, but I also secretly hope she changes her mind - or lets of us off the hook.  I despise these types of things too. 

[DawnM]

Do you remember what George Bush spoke about?

 

 

Yes.  George Bush spoke at mine.  Then the student speaker was a girl from my freshman hall, and she spoke about the mountains being special to her.

 

[Spryte]

Nope.

 

I didn't walk in mine either. But they talked about me, and my dept head tried hard to get me to come (for awards). I despise ceremonies too, but had an excuse - I was having major surgery the next day. They offered a wheelchair, but I declined. No regrets. We ate yummy Phillipino barbecue (my old roommate's dad makes the best!) and flan for dessert. Still remember that. And DH painted my toenails green for the surgery. :)

 

ETA: our oldest just walked in his. It was actually pretty cool! He's in the arts, so there were great performances.

[Belacqua]

I know our speaker was some alum who was CEO of some company I'd never heard of. Does that count as remembering?

 

I do recall that about 12 of the graduating seniors were chosen to lead groups of students into the stadium. The administration presented this as some kind of honor, but I suspect they just couldn't scare up enough faculty members to do it. Naturally, the other students paid no attention to where we told them to go, so it was utter chaos. 

[Kathryn]

No idea who spoke at any of mine.

[Heather in Neverland]

I walked for my bachelor and my first master's degree but I cannot remember who spoke at either.

[Cinder]

Ok, I was curious so I looked it up. My year the speaker was John F. Akers, Chairman of the Board, IBM. It was interesting to see how the speakers changed over the years. In the early days it was just the president of the school. During the WWII era there were a lot of military and technology bigwigs--it was an engineering school. The 70's was the start of the "celebrity" speaker. Over the years no US President has spoken but in 1934 the Prime Minister of Canada was the speaker.

 

So there you go. And no, I have never regretted not attending commencement.

[Scrub Jay]

Do you remember your commencement address?  Do you even remember who spoke at your commencement?  

 

I do remember who spoke at mine and I remember a joke he told, but other than that, I don't remember the main idea of what he said.

 

Yes but that's because it was Spike Lee.  I'm sure I would not have remembered almost 20 years later if the person hadn't been a "name."

 

ETA:  Oh, I don't really remember what he said but I remember he was mad about his team losing and being grumpy about it.  I remember thinking (and my friends, too) that his speech was disappointing and lame.

 

Edited again: Got to love Google.  I am pretty sure he as mad about this game.  http://www.baseball-almanac.com/box-scores/boxscore.php?boxid=199705180TEX

[FaithManor]

I don't remember the speaker at all. I do remember that the remarks by our college president were boring and droll. Seriously, the guy was awful.

 

I played the piano for both baccalaureate and commencement. My Rachmaninoff number was gorgeous! :D  I also played for baccalaureate and commencement the year before when dh graduated. Some politician spoke - can't remember his name - but he was funny and had an excellent address. As per his part in the whole thing, the college president was a lump on legs that was about as inspiring as having a conversation with a rock. That guy bored everyone to tears! We used to groan when we'd see his name on any program. I can tell you he was not in high demand to speak ANYWHERE. If memory serves, his last name was Kauffman or Coffman or something similarly spelled.

[Barbara H]

Do you remember what George Bush spoke about?

 

Ethics. He was VP at the time. Mostly I remember lots of security.

[school17777]

The Shriver family spoke at mine. We didn't know if they would still come as there was a death in the Kennedy family that week. The main thing that I remember is that Ethel said every family should have a daughter named Maria.

[Caroline]

The editor of the Washington Post spoke at my undergraduate one. My masters wa Dr. Tuumalla, who was head of the microelectronics research center at GT, and my PhD was Dr. Gary Mays, who had just won a young professor award at GT. Since I took classes from both of those men, it was interesting.

 

My older sister graduated from Michigan State and Lee Iacooca spoke at hers.

 

When my dad got his PhD Spiro Agnew spoke. I don't remember that, although I was there. But I have heard the story several times.

 

The governor of Ohio spoke when my mom graduated from Ohio State. He flew in on a helicopter, gave the speech, and flew out. I wasn't there for that one.

 

Cal Ripken spoke at my younger sister's graduation. I didn't attend that one.

 

At my PhD ceremony, the president of the university mentioned me by name because this was the third diploma he handed me...he was Dean of Engineering at VT when I got my BS. He was the President of Georgia Tech when I got my PhD. I was the first person he had handed all three levels to. He hugged me when I walked across the stage.

[KRG]

College was either a Texas state Senator or Representative.  I don't remember her name or what she talked about but she died shortly thereafter...

High school--I can't remember that either!  I thought it was a local TV news anchor but now that I think about it, that may have been at my sister's graduation.

[redsquirrel]

 

At my PhD ceremony, the president of the university mentioned me by name because this was the third diploma he handed me...he was Dean of Engineering at VT when I got my BS. He was the President of Georgia Tech when I got my PhD. I was the first person he had handed all three levels to. He hugged me when I walked across the stage.

 

Totally adorable story!