Commencement Remarks for the Class of 2023
President Kathleen Harring delivers remarks to the Muhlenberg College Class of 2023.Sunday, May 21, 2023 10:00 AM
Families, friends, faculty, staff and students—thank you for joining us today to honor our graduates.
Class of 2023, congratulations. We are here to celebrate you and all that you have accomplished during your time at Muhlenberg College.
And what you have accomplished – and experienced – is quite a lot. For most of you, the story of your first year at Muhlenberg began like many others. You began to find your footing, developed new friendships and had the freedom to pursue your passions. Then, in an instant, a world catastrophe upended all of this. But you persisted.
One thing I know about the pandemic is that it was rich with irony. It both forced us apart and forced us together. “Zoom university,” as Nour put it.
We could not see each other in person, much less shake hands or share a hug. Yet we shared windows into each others’ homes. We saw each others’ families and even pets. We often learned of each others’ losses in these intimate settings but could not be in the same room to mourn them. There were times when it seemed unending. Yet, it was a shared experience. We did it together, and it helped make us what we are today—a community, here, truly together, today to celebrate you.
While your college experience was novel, what helped us adapt and, ultimately, to succeed is at the core of our institutional mission: An extraordinarily effective way of thinking, learning and solving problems—the liberal arts—coupled with the power of community. Lucky for all of us that at Muhlenberg we’re great at both of those things.
The next step, what I am charging you with today, is to use this experience for empowerment, to inspire lives of meaning and consequence—not only for yourself, but for others, for your community beyond Muhlenberg. To make their lives and the world better.
This is the essence of a liberal arts education—of a Muhlenberg education.
You’ve probably heard me talk about “wicked problems” before, intractable problems like pandemics, climate disasters, racism and threats to democracy. The only way to solve these “wicked problems” is to bring together a diverse range of disciplines and use sophisticated habits of mind to work out integrated, multifaceted solutions. It’s what we do here at Muhlenberg.
It’s what happens when we bring together students like Nour, who knows so much about public health, religion and anthropology—and in fact wrote her thesis on the pandemic—and Christian, who learned coding and algorithms, and used them to build knowledge about the writings of a German philosopher.
We can’t solve every problem here at Muhlenberg. But, what we can do is produce the leaders—the scientists, artists and policy makers who go into the world and undertake these grand challenges, who solve those wicked problems.
You will be those leaders.
When we create a community where talented students feel like they belong and are valued, where they have a home where they can thrive, when they achieve more because of it, we show the world the power of community.
You are that community.
When we build and maintain that community, we build leaders. When we build leaders, we identify grand challenges and solve wicked problems.
You answer those challenges. You will solve those problems.
I know, from experience, that a Muhlenberg education transforms our students. They, in turn, transform our communities, our country and the world.
You will transform our world.
I’m saying the word “you” a lot. I mean it both in the singular and the plural. The liberal arts enjoins us to create our own education.
Each one of you is an amazing individual. At the same time, progress, innovation and success are most often the result of free, unique, and empowered individuals striving together.
Your lives will be all the more meaningful because of what we experienced here together over the past four years. They will be all the more consequential because of what we have learned together. You will have more power because we did it together.
Communities where the people empower each other—where everyone serves as a multiplier of talent—achieve more. Their people go farther.
Now you will go farther.
Distance cannot sever our ties. I know that time will not either and that all of us, together, will remain a community long after you leave your campus home.
Dear Class of 2023 … you and I have something in common. We both started this phase of our lives at the same time!
In the fall of 2019, you started your college career and I began serving as interim and then permanent President of our beloved college. We have been through a lot together and I take special pride in your achievements as individuals and as a class. You have inspired me with the challenges you have confronted, the support you have given to each other and the resilience you have shown.
At some point, not too long from now, I know that you will begin to see how your Muhlenberg liberal arts education and the special community on this campus that fostered it is helping you recognize challenges and solve problems in a way that others can’t. It is a good feeling. When that happens, come back and tell us all about it.
Congratulations, Class of 2023. I look forward to welcoming you back to your Muhlenberg home and seeing the successes your future holds. Now go and change the world!
