Greetings, members of the Harvard College Class of 2025.
Someone asked me recently how I felt when I arrived where you will be on Thursday morning. The conclusion of your undergraduate career is much like reaching any destination. To know how far you have actually traveled, don’t consider time alone. Consider your triumphs and defeats, your pain and tears, your joy and laughter—I hope much more of the latter—the relationships that you developed and the challenges you overcame. As you savor your memories, I hope that you will experience an exquisite awareness—perhaps for the first time—that all of these things—the moments large and small, the places and the people, the p-sets and the papers, the sights and sounds and other senses of being here, on this campus in your favorites spots with your favorite folks—will very soon stir in your young heart the bittersweet pangs of nostalgia.
How did I feel on my own Commencement Day, some 49 years and, it seems, just a moment ago, when I was where you will be in 44 hours, give or take some minutes?
I felt profound gratitude.
First for my friends and my classmates. Their aspirations and their dreams—their skills and their intensity about nearly everything—intimidated me, astonished me, and ultimately inspired me. They changed how I thought about myself. We went through so much together as students. Much of what seemed like crushing blows then seem like laughing matters now, and much that we thought mattered little turned out to matter a lot. The relationships we build, especially with our fellow students, matter over a lifetime. Throughout my own career, I have had a front row seat to the many successes of my friends and classmates, and they continue to inspire me. The people who knew you when are irreplaceable.
For you, when is now. Recall your own Harvard move-in, spread across three days, giving you ample time to overflow our housing, meet one another, and settle into new spaces that you soon made your own. You were excited and nervous, undoubtedly intimidated by (yet inevitably drawn to) your interesting and accomplished peers. They became your confidantes, co-commiserators, champions, and cheerleaders. Your family away from family, your home away from home.
After your class photo is taken on the steps of Widener, try to remember your earliest interactions with one another. What were your first impressions? How did they change—or not? And what do you admire most about each other now? And then articulate your appreciation—and use me as an excuse to be a bit more effusive than you might be otherwise because this is the perfect time to be profuse in your thanks and praise. You will be remembered for it, even if – especially if – it tests the boundary of credibility.
Second, I felt grateful for my teachers. When I entered Dunster House my second year, Jerome Culp, the resident tutor in economics, convinced me that I should switch concentrations from biochemistry to economics because I had enjoyed EC10 so much. (Not to dissuade any of you would-be biochemists out there.) Jerome also suggested that I take more challenging courses and become a research assistant. That conversation with him changed my life. I still think about it all these years later.
Who inspired you? Who gave you the attention and gentle nudging you needed exactly when you needed it? Who kindled your true ambition? Send that note you have been meaning to send to a mentor who meant more to you than they might realize. Though we teachers can seem to know everything, or at least seem to think we know everything, we’re all thrilled when we receive confirmation that we’re truly helping our students gain new insights about the subjects we teach and acquire more of the skills that will serve them well throughout their lives. Your generous praise will be cherished for years to come.
And, finally, I felt grateful for the University. Harvard, like any institution, may never achieve all of our highest aspirations, but—however imperfect—it is a beautiful and enduring expression of humanity’s confidence in the power of knowledge to change the lives of individuals, the prospects of communities, and the course of human progress. I hope that you—like me—have found that when you became a part of Harvard, you began to build a stronger foundation for all that you dream of achieving than you could have imagined. I hope these years have been for you a rare chance to study and learn in the good company of some of the most talented people you may ever encounter.
The best way to acknowledge Harvard—and what this time has meant to you—is to advocate for education. Not only higher education—education from preschool to postdoc and beyond.
Everything we might achieve—morally, scientifically, technologically, and even economically—is grounded in knowledge.
Where else are you more likely to find a path to knowledge and all that it unlocks for humanity than in education?
Let your gratitude on Commencement Day become your attitude in life. Make it your mission to put more people on trajectories that yield knowledge and understanding—that build capacities for listening and learning—that generate genuine empathy and sympathy. Ensure that the journeys of others look more like your own than less, that more people have the opportunity to take a trip like the one that you have taken. When you look back—many, many years from now—you will be proud that you did, and others will be profoundly grateful for your efforts.
We are proud of you, and we are eager to see all the good that your work will enable in the years to come. May these final 44 hours—give or take some minutes—be filled with opportunities to celebrate how far you have traveled since your arrival. You have done so much. Rest on your laurels but not for too long. The world, with its countless magnificent destinations, awaits you.
Thank you.