When Ohio University President Duane Nellis took to the stage to deliver his first OU commencement address, he set an ominous tone, painting a picture of a divided country, marred by political divisions and financial inequality.
“You think I’m talking about the present day, don’t you?” he said.
In fact, Nellis was describing his own college years, when he was an undergraduate student at Montana State University. Between the 1976 presidential election, the Watergate scandal and the Vietnam War, the future, Nellis said, felt uncertain.
“But I want to empower you today,” he said. “I want you to feel confident that the education you have just received will serve you well.”
Many of the about 900 students receiving their diplomas Saturday were the first in their families to do so. One-third of the 2017 freshman class identify as first-generation college students.
Both Nellis and his wife, Ruthie, were first-generation students, as well.
“I stand before you today because people around me believed in me enough for me to believe in myself,” Nellis said. “And I know that many of you are here today for that reason.”
Elizabeth Sayrs, University College dean and vice provost for Undergraduate Education, thanked faculty members for their contributions to student success.
“Through your research and creative activity, you’re helping address some of our society’s greatest challenges,” Sayrs said. “Thank you for caring so deeply about our students. The time and energy you have invested in these graduates is an investment in their future success.”
Thomas Carpenter, distinguished professor of classics and director of the Ping Institute for the Teaching of the Humanities, served as the commencement speaker. Classically trained as an archeologist, Carpenter has degrees from Johns Hopkins, Harvard and Oxford.
“This ceremony, as you can see on your program, is called a commencement,” Carpenter said. “A beginning ... it marks the beginning of a new stage in your life.”
Carpenter said his own life has had “innumerable commencements” since his own undergraduate graduation.
“When I graduated from college, it never crossed my mind that I would be a professor,” he said. “I thought I was a poet, a novelist.”
Since then, Carpenter has become an expert in ancient Greek religion and iconography, publishing numerous books including Art and Myth in Ancient Greece, which has been translated into six languages.
“Earning a degree from Ohio University is not a small thing,” Carpenter said. “You become part of a noble tradition that stretches back over 200 years.”
In sending off the graduating class, Nellis asked the new alumni to take their new skills and use them for good.
“And remember, no matter how far from this university you roam, Athens will always be your home," Nellis said. "No matter how much our world changes, everyone in this room will continue to share a common bond that will never be broken. We are, and always will be, Bobcats.”
