Commencement

Thank you all so much for the kind comments you have left over the last several days. I think the nicest people in the world must read my blog.

The George Washington University graduation was spectacular on many fronts, but not the least was that 10 members of Sara's family were together in the front two rows of the crowd of 22,000.

The picture on the left is from the school's website

Below is the speech given by Sara Ray on May 18, 2008.

As a junior in high school, my mother told me that my best memories of college would be of staying up late with friends solving the world’s problems over leftover pizza. At the time, I thought that sounded like a pretty dim forecast of college. Now, however, six years later, I will very publicly admit that my mother, on THIS point, was correct. Today, I’d like to talk to you about this sentiment, how it relates to my experience at GW and how it assures me that the real world is nothing for us to fear.

First of all, I’d like to thank the remainder of my class for the faith you’ve given me in our generation. For years, people our age have been typecast as apathetic, selfish, close-minded and lacking a social conscience. Our late night discussions, arguments and strategizing over pizza boxes are what have convinced me unfailingly that this characterization is false. In our lives, we’ve seen our environment fade, politics divide our country and we’ve all seen friends sent overseas to Iraq and Afghanistan. Our generation is not one that can afford to be passive and, over our years at GW, we have learned to incorporate that mindset into our studies, friendships and lives. We argue into the wee hours of the morning about what candidate will save our nation, we learn Arabic and Chinese and we innovate with administrators to make our corner of the earth at GW a more ecologically friendly one. Now, as seniors, I am humbled and amazed at the sheer number of my phenomenally qualified peers foregoing lucrative careers to go into the Peace Corps or Teach for America. Our social conscience is alive, and it’s pulsing.

Each one of us has a unique story, a different path through our university poising us to go different places to do different things. I came to GW wanting to be a physics major, a dream that lasted precisely one calculus class. It wasn’t my crushing failures in calculus that convinced me I wasn’t a physicist. Rather, it was the feeling I got when talking about language and culture and its role in building bridges between cultures with my peers that convinced me I was an anthropologist. Interning full time, unpaid with the State Department gave me a passion for education as a mechanism for foreign relations and a dispassion for office jobs. Working on Colonial Cabinet 2006 showed me how much I loved working as a part of a highly energized team. Those experiences now imprinted in my personal history, they’ve led me to the future of my dreams: going to Macedonia for two years to teach English with the Peace Corps.

Every one of us could tell a similar story. Each one of us has an issue or a cause that, no matter what the hour, ignites the deepest passion within us. And I believe many of us have realized that our true calling in life is to address that issue with action. Some of you are holding the solution to the medical crises that plague the planet. A remarkable number of you have been grabbed by the pressing need to help alleviate inequality in our domestic education system. Over four years, I’ve heard many visions of the ideal president and I am not doubtful that he or she sits somewhere in front of me today.

This is the last time that our paths are convergent. A ten-person trip to a restaurant will never again be as simple as a few phone calls and text messages. To this end, I’d like to give credit to my father on being correct when he told me that I would meet people in college who would remain my friends forever. Ladies and gentlemen of the class of 2008, there’s nothing for us to be afraid of. In the past four years, we have honed in on the passions that drive us and found the people who will always hold us up. No matter where you go or what you do, you have found people, sitting with you somewhere here today, that will be there at your wedding, baby shower, bachelor party, retirement party and, if all goes well, will be there wreaking havoc in the nursing home right by your side.

Today is graduation. We are graduating from sitting with friends talking over pizza about how to make the world a better place. Today, everyone, is commencement. It is the beginning. We are graduating from talk and commencing to action to leave this world a better place than we found it. Take the lessons you’ve learned, the friendships you’ve forged, get out into the world and let’s make it work.