EILEEN BARROSO
The annual ceremony returned to its traditional location, on the lawns between Butler and Low Libraries. With “Pomp and Circumstance” setting the mood, more than 1,340 seniors marched in with cheers, smiles and waves. Necks craned as families sought to find their graduates, with phone video cameras rolling.
Among the program’s featured speakers were Dean Josef Sorett; the keynote speaker, Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Jodi Kantor CC’96; student speaker Thomas Edwards CC’25; and senior class president Rohan Mehta CC’25.
Edwards was among the first to take the stage, opening with a “Surprise!” to his parents, from whom he’d kept his selection as essayist a secret. With a wry nod to the time-worn names on Butler’s exterior, he talked about the importance of storytelling and legacy. But “the thing about legacy is that it isn’t handed to you at the finish line,” he said. “It isn’t a trophy. It’s something you construct, moment by moment, without realizing it.
“Our legacy is booming, impactful, resilient. No one can deny the impact that the Class of 2025 had on this university and the world outside those Gates.”
Mehta drew laughs as he recounted a first-year escapade where he climbed with a friend to the roof of Low Library to catch a break from NSOP nerves: “Up there, it felt like we were on the precipice of some great unknown,” he said. Later, referencing the tumult of the past few years, he spoke to the class’ “inspiring” resilience, highlighting the excellent work of Spectator and WKCR journalists, the Columbia College Student Council members who distributed food to students when dining halls were closed and the student senators who advocated for their peers.
“And most critically, we all checked in on our friends more and opened our apartments and suites to build all forms of community … It gives me so much hope that we are ready to take on the world. Our time here wasn’t simple. … So thank God we learned here, and had our ideas challenged here. Thank God we grew here.”
Dean of Academic Affairs Lisa Hollibaugh presented a number of awards, including to the valedictorian, Eilidh MacLeod CC’25, and salutatorian, Suwei Ma CC’25. Afterward, Raymond Yu ’89, SEAS’90, president of the Columbia College Alumni Association, awarded alumni prizes. Acting president Claire Shipman CC’86, SIPA’94 also gave remarks.
Jodi Kantor CC’96
EILEEN BARROSO
Sharing her own story of being kicked off Spectator, and later dropping out of Harvard Law School, Kantor warned students against assuming that their College experience would dictate their futures, and told them not to be afraid to change their minds. “If any of the trains you get on turn out to be heading in the wrong direction, get off the train,” she said. “Don’t be overly afraid of risk and, especially right now, be wary of predicting which fields are the most promising. These predictions can eliminate all sorts of magic and meaning.”
She also encouraged students to focus on craft — that “combination of expertise and skill” that can lead to success and fulfillment — and need. “What is your own independent assessment of what society will need most during your working years?” she asked. “What kind of care, what kind of productions, what kind of information? Do not be the people who fail to understand the opportunities this moment presents. And they are massive opportunities, precisely because everything is in question.”
Kantor continued: “Class of 2025, your lives are your move. The best people in life and history are the ones who take negative, even devastating, stimuli and formulate powerful, productive responses. If you find your craft and your need, you will experience growth — professional and personal — that feels at once like transcending your boundaries and returning to your truest self.”
Dean Josef Sorett
EILEEN BARROSO
“Our society, at any level as you choose to define it, cannot function without some shared frame of reference,” Sorett said. “What results when we lose our ability to recognize common principles, something shared across our differences?”
He acknowledged there are no easy answers: “It takes work. It takes an inquisitive mind. It takes individuals willing to listen to one another; a willingness to accept that our own assumptions may be incorrect. It takes patience and an openness to the possibility that strangers who embody every imaginable kind of difference — even purported ‘adversaries’ — can find and pursue a common purpose. This is the power that the idea of this academic community holds; a vision that is as socially inclusive as it is intellectually expansive.”
Sorett urged graduates to be patient as they move on to “the world beyond the Gates.” “Not patience in the face of injustice,” he added. “Not complacency with the state of the world. I — no, we — expect that you will continue to struggle to make this world a better place. You are Lions, after all.
“My hope for you is that you will be patient with, and extend grace to, the people you encounter along the way. Good people get it wrong every single day. People of integrity don’t always make the best decisions. Yet outward appearances — even our actions — only tell a part of the story.
Sorett concluded: “It is my firm belief that before me sit the leaders, thinkers and principled actors who will help forge a brighter future — even in the face of all that confronts us. … And so, Class of 2025, I leave you with my most sincere salutations, with confidence in your capacity to face forward with grace and my deepest respect. Congratulations! And good luck on the journey ahead.”