Nearly 20,000 friends and family crowded into the home-side bleachers of Ryan Field on Friday to celebrate the graduation of Northwestern’s class of 2008.
The gates to the field opened at 4 p.m. for the 6 p.m. ceremony and guests began filing in immediately. Some families arrived in trains of chauffeured black luxury vehicles, while others came on foot and still more were dropped off by a fleet of buses that made stops at various campus locations to pick up passengers.
The forecast called for scattered thunderstorms throughout the afternoon and evening and dark clouds threatened the ceremony as the stands filled. Back in the N-Club – a space just outside of Ryan Field reserved for various honorary degree recipients, presenters and members of the media – the commencement planners worried that it might rain.
The decision was made that the ceremony would be held on Ryan Field, rain or shine, as it was too late to move the crowd into the backup space, Welsh-Ryan Arena. If the severe weather plan were put into action only two guests per graduating student would be allowed into the arena, leaving eight people waiting outside for the ceremony to end.
A slow rain began around 5:20 p.m. and those waiting on the bleachers moved to the top seats in Ryan Field where an overhang shielded them from the inclement weather. At 6 p.m., though, the skies cleared and the weather improved as nearly 2,000 students donning purple gowns and black caps filed into their seats on the field.
Waiting for their contemporaries to arrive, many students were seen talking on cell phones and waving frantically at the crowd, presumably trying to locate their friends and family members. One such family member, anxious that the rain would return, asked how the ceremony would proceed if it did. Now too late to move indoors, a storm would force an accelerated version of the event; “All the graduates stand and then all the graduates sit,” said Al Cubbage, vice president of university relations. “The Ph.D’s? They don’t walk.”
After the processional, graduating student Suzanne Marina Post, accompanied by the Northwestern University Wind Ensemble, led the crowd in singing the national anthem. A significant number of audience members joined in and the collection of voices soared above the field.
University Chaplain Timothy S. Stevens delivered the invocation, inviting listeners of all faiths to “share together in our own way a moment of solemn reflection and joyous thanks giving.” Speeches by Patrick G. Ryan, the chair of Northwestern’s Board of Trustees, and Alan Wolfson, the president of the Northwestern Alumni Association, followed. Wolfson welcomed the class of 2008 to a “distinguished community of leaders, thinkers and people of the highest order of excellence” and encouraged them to develop a lifelong relationship with their university.
Afterwards, newly appointed emeritus faculty were recognized and honorary degrees were awarded. Appointed by the Board of Trustees, with the approval of the Provost, 23 faculty members were given emeritus status. Together, they contributed over six centuries of service to Northwestern University. “As scholars and performers they have helped transform their disciplines,” said University President Henry Bienen. “Their impact upon the students with whom they have worked is incalculable.”
Seven individuals received honorary degrees, ranging from Doctor of Arts to Doctor of Science. Cheryle R. Jackson, a trustee of the university, presented Chicago Mayor Richard M. Daley with a honorary Doctor of Laws degree in part due to improvement in Chicago Public School facilities and student performance since he assumed responsibility of CPS as mayor. Jackson also cited a drop in Chicago’s crime rate every year since 1992 thanks to Daley’s community policing program.
Other honorary degree recipients include John Adams, one of the most widely performed composers today, Christopher R. Browning, a preeminent scholar of the Holocaust, Bill Emmott, former editor in chief of The Economist, Lorraine H. Morton, the mayor of Evanston since 1993, C.N.R. Rao, a researcher of solid-state science and crystal chemistry with nearly 1,500 scientific publications to his credit, and Sheila E. Widnall, former secretary of the U.S. Air Force and professor of aeronautics and astronautics at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
After Daley received his honorary degree, he was reintroduced to the crowd by graduating student Randall Todd Johnson who took the stage to a heavy round of applause from his fellow seniors. “Mayor Daley attacked the city’s problems head on,” Johnson said, “Today, Chicago is known worldwide as America’s most-livable big city.”
Direct and provocative, Daley’s commencement address focused on how Northwestern graduates should use the tools given them by friends, family, and the Northwestern community to pursue their passions and change the world. “Hold on to your ideas and principals, pursue them with the steadfast notion that one determined person can power change that lifts a generation and, yes, even a nation,” Daley said. “Don’t let the cynics and skeptics discourage you: you can make a difference. In fact, we’re counting on you.”
Daley encouraged graduates to consider those less fortunate and asked for help from the class of 2008. He said that Northwestern and the “great city of Chicago” have a long relationship, making commencement a good opportunity for new graduates to work in and for the city.
Daley suggested that graduates help the city by tutoring students in the ailing Chicago Public School system. “There are so many children who desperately need your help,” he said. “I ask you read to them, tutor them, mentor them. There is nothing more important that you will do in your life than helping a child in need.”
Another way to help Chicago is to drum up excitement for the 2016 Olympic and Paralympic Games. If Chicago is chosen from the four remaining potential host cities, Daley said, the Games could help improve the quality of life for every resident. “(The Games) would attract new visitors from around the world to the United States and Chicago, increasing our standing as a global city, generate good will, and create new business and jobs for the people of our region.” Graduates can help, alongside their family and friends in attendance at commencement, by volunteering and showing support in other ways, Daley said.
The selection of Mayor Daley as commencement speaker wasn’t officially announced by the university until Monday, May 26, after an unusually long delay. “We are pleased to have Mayor Daley as our commencement speaker,” said President Bienen. “He has served the City of Chicago with great distinction.”
The announcement was met primarily with a negative reaction from students. Hundreds of readers left comments on The Daily Northwestern’s Web site expressing outrage at the decision, with several asking if it was a joke. “This is undoubtedly one of the biggest letdowns of my Northwestern career,” wrote one commenter identified as a senior. “For a university that constantly pushes its students to go above and beyond, I wish the administration had done the same when searching for a graduation speaker instead of settling as it so clearly did.”
Daley’s address, which ran a little under sixteen minutes in length, was met by a standing ovation from the faculty members and honorary degree recipients behind him while zero students and only a handful of audience members followed suit.
There is no word yet on who will be speaking at Northwestern’s 151st commencement.
Bienen, who was elected as Northwestern’s fifteenth president in June 1994, delivered the 1995 commencement address to graduating seniors after completing his first year in office. He said, however, it is “very unlikely” that the new president chosen to replace him will deliver the 2009 speech.
Bienen also said that he would not deliver next year’s address personally. “I always talk at these things for about two minute
s so maybe this will be a little longer but it’s not going to be the commencement speech,” he said.
As far as who the speaker will be, “I haven’t even put my mind to it,” Bienen said. “There might be more than one.”
