Matriculation Address 2002

Tufts' 12th President Welcomes Students -- August 28, 2002

Ladies and gentlemen, members of the faculty, staff and administration, alumni, trustees and friends, but most of all, our honored guests - members of the Class of 2006 and your families. Welcome to Tufts and to this ceremony that marks the start of what I hope will be your lifelong affiliation with this great University.

Today you officially become Tufts students and join generations of others who have preceded you on this Hill. I know that you have awaited this day with great anticipation. Some may have even thought it would never come.

You have suffered through numerous college tours, SAT exams, rewrites of college essays, interviews, and the wait for acceptance letters. You wondered about who your roommate would be, what your dorm would look like, how you would get all of your worldly possessions to Tufts without renting a U-Haul. You worried about what computer to get, what clothes to bring, whether you should sign up for a cell phone with a Boston area code or one from back home. I could go on... All of these decisions are now behind you. Now you can focus on why you are really here - to get a wonderful education.

You are about to begin a new chapter in your life, one marked by independence, exploration, and engagement in the life of the mind. What will you make of this experience? How will you grow intellectually and socially? What will you contribute to this learning community? What will you take from it?

You are fortunate to be entering college at a truly remarkable moment in time. The pace of scientific and technical progress is extraordinary. Each advance brings its own set of challenges for society - new questions to be asked and answered.

In the time since your parents and I graduated from high school - and I assure it was not all that long ago - we have seen the development of the personal computer, the fax machine, cell phones, artificial organs, cloning, test tube babies, magnetic resonance imaging, GPS, cable TV, the World Wide Web, email, instant messaging, CNN, and MTV. The Iron Curtain has fallen, apartheid no longer exists, much of Europe has adopted a common currency, and globalization now defines the market for capital, labor, and many goods and services.

What will the future bring? What scientific and technological advances await us? How will society be shaped by social and economic movements yet to occur? While I cannot predict with any degree of accuracy what awaits us, I do know that many of you will help to define this future. Like those who have preceded you on this Hill, you will go forward with your Tufts education to make a difference.

In electing to matriculate at Tufts, you have decided to attend a research university; a place where faculty are passionately engaged in pushing the frontiers of new knowledge. Your teachers are fundamentally curious people. Some of them seek to understand the lessons of history; others are interested in understanding the history of the universe. Some plot the movement of tectonic plates; others try to understand social movements. Some are interested in how infants acquire language; others try to understand how the concept of gender is expressed in different languages. Some invent new technologies; others try to understand how new technologies influence how we live and work.

You have an opportunity to be part of this process. Get to know your professors. Talk to them about their research. Even more importantly, get involved! You will discover that their enthusiasm and curiosity are infectious. You will discover the thrill of being part of the process of generating new knowledge - of being the very first person on the face of the planet to really understand a new phenomenon. You will also discover that faculty teach at Tufts because they love students and they love teaching. You are the reason they are here.

You will take many subjects while you are at Tufts. Some will be required. Many will be of your own choosing. Some of you arrive here with a clear knowledge of what you think you want to do with your lives. Others are hoping that your path to the future will reveal itself to you in the next four years.

My advice is to sample broadly from what Tufts has to offer. Don't cling too fiercely to preconceived notions of what you think you want to do. Be prepared to discover your intellectual passion and then have the courage to pursue it. I went off to college convinced I was going to be a lawyer. Along the way I took a course in economics and was smitten. The rest, as they say, is history.

Each of you will grow intellectually during the next four years. You will be challenged by your professors and by your peers. But in addition to the lessons you will learn in the classroom, there is also much to learn beyond it. I graduated from college exactly 30 years ago.

Some of the most valuable lessons I learned - lessons about leadership, teamwork, getting people to work together for a common purpose - the kinds of lessons that are invaluable to a college president, I learned while playing on a varsity team. You will find many great teachers at Tufts. Some of them will be in the classroom, but many will also be on the playing fields, in your living groups, among the advisers to student organizations. If you approach every activity at Tufts as a learning opportunity, you will make the most of your Tufts education.

You are going to school in one of the truly great cities of the world. Get to know Boston. You will find a city steeped in culture, history, and wonderfully distinct and interesting neighborhoods. Walk the Freedom Trail. Go to the North End, Chinatown, Back Bay, and the waterfront. Visit the city's great museums - admission to the Museum of Fine Arts is free to all Tufts students. Take in a concert at Symphony Hall. Go to Lexington and Concord. Retrace Paul Revere's ride - he passed within a mile of here. Visit Royall House, one of the stops on the Underground Railroad located just a few blocks from this Hill. And of course, everyone should make the obligatory pilgrimage to that holiest of Boston shrines - Fenway Park. Even Yankee fans are welcome.

Last year I addressed the Class of 2005 as a first year President. Today I stand before you as a rising sophomore. I have learned much about Tufts in the past 12 months. I have learned that this is a caring, supportive, and welcoming community. These qualities were self-evident in the aftermath of September 11th when we truly came together as one. It was not an easy time for students to be away from home or for parents to be separated from their sons and daughters. This was especially true of our international students. However, it was our common bond - our basic humanity and decency - that helped sustain us. As we struggled to make sense of senseless acts and to comprehend the incomprehensible, we drew together. Our faculty worked to find the teachable moment. We talked. We listened. We learned from each other. I was incredibly proud of our collective response to these horrific events.

Over the course of this past year I have also learned that we take our work seriously but not ourselves - that we have the capacity to laugh at ourselves. I have learned that Tufts students are not afraid to speak their mind, often expressing their opinions sharply even to university presidents. In my travels this past year to visit 22 different cities to speak to Tufts alumni groups I have learned that our graduates care deeply about this special place. Indeed, they are an extraordinary resource for each of you and stand ready to help you in many different ways.

In four years when you become alumni, I hope that each of you will also reach out to help the next generation of Tufts students who will follow you to this hill.

Over the course of the next four years you will discover the true meaning of the word "diversity." At Tufts we embrace diversity because we learn from our differences. You will meet many different kinds of people here. You will encounter classmates from all 50 states and many different countries and cultures. In some ways we are a microcosm of the larger world we inhabit, complete with some of the same tensions, frustrations, and opportunities for mutual learning and education.

Tufts is not perfect, although we constantly strive to be better. One of your responsibilities as a citizen of Tufts is to treat other members of the community with civility and respect. None of us has all the answers. We can all learn from each other but only if we are willing to listen, and listening is everyone's responsibility.

But diversity goes beyond racial, ethnic, socioeconomic, gender, religious and cultural differences. At Tufts we also embrace diversity of thought. You are here to be challenged on your ideas by people who think differently from you. Sometimes you will be challenged in ways that make you feel uncomfortable. One sign of intellectual maturity is the ability to accept an intellectual challenge without interpreting it as a personal affront. A great university does not embrace orthodoxy of thought. Rather we embrace intellectual rigor and discourse.

Now all this talk of rigor and discourse and challenge and opportunity may be a bit frightening. If you are like most first year students, today you are probably feeling a fair amount of excitement tempered by more than a bit of anxiety. Rest assured, this is normal. Our admissions committee does not make mistakes.

You are a member of the Class of 2006 because you belong here; because you have distinguished yourselves as among the very best students this country and many other countries have to offer. I hope you will leave your mark not just on Tufts but on the larger world we inhabit, just like the Tufts men and women who have preceded you on this Hill.

I think of people like former Senator Daniel Patrick Moynihan, Class of 1948. Or Rick Hauck, Class of 1962, four time commander of the space shuttle and a member of the Astronaut Hall of Fame. Or Professor Martha Constantine-Patton, Class of 1969, distinguished neurobiologist. Or Steve Tisch, Class of 1971, Oscar winning producer of Forrest Gump. Or Neal Shapiro, Class of 1980, President of NBC News. Or Deborah Jospin, Class of 1980, former head of AmeriCorps. I fully expect that some day, either I or one of my successors will be describing your accomplishments to successive generations of Tufts students. May you each find inspiration during your next four years at Tufts. Class of 2006, we have great expectations for you.

Class of 2006, in the next few hours you will say goodbye to your friends and family. You will be truly on your own. No one will tell you when to study, what to eat, when to go to sleep. If your roommate will tolerate the mess, no one will even tell you to clean up your room. Part of what you are here to learn is to make these choices and others responsibly. We have great confidence in your ability to do so.

You have been prepared well for this day by your parents, family and friends. They have raised you to be independent men and women. Many of your parents have also sacrificed substantially so that you may enjoy the privilege of a Tufts education. I have a favor to ask of each of you. Please stay in touch with your families. Like you they are going through a period of adjustment. Since the day they brought you home from the hospital you have been the center of their lives.

Now you must learn to live on your own, and they must adjust to a life in which you are no longer a constant presence. It is up to you to help them through this period of adjustment. Send them email. Give them a call. They will also deeply appreciate the occasional letter.

And now a word for the parents. Being a parent is not always easy. The fact that your sons and daughters are matriculating at Tufts is evidence that you have done your job well. However, while I am certain that you are enormously proud of your kids, no doubt today is a day of mixed emotions. My wife Adele and I understand how you feel.

On Monday we put our youngest son on an airplane to spend his junior year abroad. With him went our hopes and aspirations, and what remained behind was a touch of anxiety. No doubt you are anxious about whether your children are ready, whether they are prepared for all that awaits them, whether they will act with maturity, whether they will use good judgment. We all raise our children to be independent, yet when they reach the moment when they are ready to spread their wings our natural inclination is to cling to them.

I must now ask you to do the hardest thing you have ever done as a parent. Let go. You must trust your sons and daughters to make the right choices. Of course they will make mistakes. We all do. But you must also give them the space and the opportunity to learn from their errors. Rest assured they will remember the lessons that you, their first teachers, have taught them. And of course, we are here to help. This is a caring place, a good place. All of us at Tufts are here to help your sons and daughters continue to grow and learn, to build upon the wonderful foundation that you have so lovingly provided to them.

So, members of the Class of 2006, welcome and congratulations! Your time has come. I speak for the entire faculty and staff of this great university when I say we are delighted to have you join this special community and to take your place on the Hill. We look forward to getting to know you, to teaching you, to learning from you and with you. May your next four years be filled with challenge, opportunity, growth, and fulfillment.

Thank you very much.