By Jacquie Powers
Cornell President Hunter Rawlings, in his first commencement since assuming the presidency, urged the almost 6,000 students receiving degrees to enrich their lives by continuing the tradition and practice of learning that they have profited from during their years at Cornell.
"If there is one message I hope you'll take with you it is, 'Don't stop now.' You have learned a lot. You leave with a lot. But it is not enough. Keep on learning -- and your life will be rich and full," Rawlings told celebrants at the 128th Commencement May 26.
Under fair skies at Schoellkopf Field, before embarking on the heart of his
commencement message, Rawlings thanked the graduating class for a string of
accomplishments that drew rounds of applause and bursts of laughter. These included
thanks for filling Lynah Rink and helping bring back Ivy titles for both the men's
and women's ice hockey teams; thanks for setting the standard for public service;
thanks for a rainy, sane and safe Slope Day; and,
to the biggest outbreak of applause, "thank you for reassuring me that the Cornell
tradition of demonstrations and protests is alive and well. By conservative
estimate, you've participated in -- or endured --
three major protests, and at least 103 minor skirmishes. You've protested everything
from the GOP's Contract with America, to student aid cuts; from vandalism of
Daniel Martinez's Arts Quad sculpture, to proposed changes in residential housing
policy, to whether the university should -- or
should
not -- try to rescue a stranded deer."
Turning more serious, Rawlings told graduates, their families and friends
that, "in its variety and its scope, Cornell is
the quintessential research university of the late 20th century. It has a remarkable,
indeed unique, collection of academic resources
-- statutory and endowed, practical and theoretical -- dedicated to public service, as
well as to research, scholarship and teaching. Charting new ground at its founding as
the first truly American university, it has con
tinued evolving to meet emerging state and national needs. Like other institutions of
its kind, it has vastly increased the nation's research capacity; given us
breathtaking advances in the sciences and in
medicine; and, in more recent decades, expanded
technology-transfer operations that stimulate economic development. The American
research university, of which Cornell is such a splendid example, has a remarkable
range, a wealth of dimensions. Over the past few years, you've confronted that
complexity and put it to good use."
Rawlings pointed out, however, that "within its complexity and diversity, the university retains certain core values that have made it among the most long-lived of human institutions as well as among the most responsive to change.
"We work here at Cornell to assure that 460 years in the future, many of today's universities, including Cornell, will still exist as universities, in recognizable form. They will adapt to the changing environment they confront, which is a prerequisite for survival, but they will still provide teaching, research and public service of the highest quality. And they will retain certain core values which are essential to their strength. These core values have been the foundation of your Cornell education, and they will continue to serve you, and the university, well."
Rawlings pointed to three core values: "The first is intellectual honesty, that is respect for the evidence. Intellectual honesty is what enables you to entertain ideas which are foreign to you or with which you disagree. It is because intellectual honesty is so fundamental to the university that academic freedom is something we fight vigorously to preserve. Informed by their own research and scholarship, for which we demand an objective and rigorous accounting, we give faculty the right and the responsibility to seek their own areas of intellectual interest, no matter how controversial. In return, we expect that all members of this intellectual community, faculty and students alike, will be willing to ask the hard questions, to examine assumptions, to scrutinize data, to think critically about what is discovered in an effort, not simply to support one's own position, but to move closer to the truth. Cornell has given you the skills -- and, I hope, the desire -- to do that, for intellectual honesty has application far beyond Cornell.
"The second core value of the university is respect for other people and their points of view. For all their diversity, institutions like Cornell can and also must play a unifying role. Drawing on the breadth of backgrounds and experiences found among its individual members, a university is also a place to shelter debate, to encourage dialogue and to explore the potential of diversity to both enrich and reinforce community. Voltaire is often quoted as having said, 'I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it.' Too often our current debates -- political and social -- are framed in terms of winners and losers rather than a need to find a common ground....
"The third core value is the desire to keep on learning. You've probably heard the old truism that half of what you've learned will be obsolete in five years -- but you don't know which half. Most of us could not have predicted five years ago that people would be surfing the Net to find everything from Chinese take-out restaurants to the latest economic data on Latin America. The Web has become as much a part of the culture of higher education as the slide rule was in the 40s, 50s and 60s or the hand-held calculator was a decade or two ago -- and most of you have jumped into the newest technology with great gusto. Much more gusto than I have mustered.
"But it is a constant challenge -- for students and graduates alike -- to think deeply about ideas. Deep thinking is hard, and it's not much fun. Most of us would rather watch TV. As a result many of us become fixed in our positions early in life and we hold those positions for 30 or 40 years. Or we become paralyzed into inaction by the sheer volume of information we must somehow absorb....
"Without deep thinking, we are in danger of drowning in the sea of hyperinformation. With it, we have the prospect, at least, of navigating through the ever-roiling waters toward a distant shore of promise and hope. One of the most important things a university can do is to give students the desire to keep on thinking deeply and learning eagerly throughout their lives. I hope Cornell has done that for you."
A full text of Rawlings' speech can be found on the World Wide Web at http://www.news.cornell.edu/campus/gradspeech96.html.