Ryan to Graduates: Carry This Place With You

Mr. Rector, members of the Board of Visitors, students, colleagues, family, friends – welcome to Final Exercises.

My name is Jim Ryan, and in addition to being the president of UVA, I am your host for today’s ceremony, and I will also officially award the degrees.

Today marks the end of the 196th Academic Session, and we are here to celebrate and confer degrees on students from nine of the University’s schools: the School of Medicine, the School of Law, the School of Engineering and Applied Science, the Darden Graduate School of Business Administration, the School of Architecture, the School of Nursing, the McIntire School of Commerce, the School of Continuing and Professional Studies, and the School of Data Science. Yesterday, we conferred degrees for the College and Graduate School of Arts & Sciences, the School of Education and Human Development, and the Frank Batten School of Public Policy.

Today, we celebrate students and families who worked hard to get to this point, including some who overcame enormous challenges. Everyone here has a story to tell. One of today’s graduates, for example, is a father earning his bachelor’s degree 24 hours after his daughter walked the Lawn yesterday. Some are veterans, completing their education after serving our country. Others are the first in their family to graduate from college. We have one graduate who is 80 years old and several who are 19.

All of those stories – all of your stories – are important, and every graduate here has earned this moment of celebration, as have their families.

Before we begin, I would like to acknowledge graduating student-athletes who cannot be here today, including members of our baseball, softball, men’s tennis, women’s golf, rowing, and track and field teams, who are competing this weekend. Go Hoos!

I’d also like to remember four members of this class who passed away before they were able to graduate: Michael McFarlane, who is receiving a posthumous degree from the School of Data Science; Marc Rockwell-Pate, who studied in the Darden School of Business; Tessa Wiseman, at UVA Law; and Vidhi Agarwal, who was admitted to Darden, but passed away before she could enroll. These students will be remembered and honored here by all those whose lives they touched.

I would also like to recognize several University leaders who are retiring or departing this year, including Provost Ian Baucom, University Librarian and Dean of Libraries John Unsworth, interim Dean of Students Cedric Rucker, Dean of the McIntire School of Commerce Nicole Thorne Jenkins, and Senior Vice President for Operations and State Government Relations Colette Sheehy. Each of these leaders has shaped the University in profound ways, and I’m grateful to them for their service.

Finally, I’d like to offer some thanks.

First, thank you to the U.S. Army Training and Doctrine Command Band from Fort Eustis, Virginia, which is performing our music today. Please join me in a round of applause for them, as well as for the members of our ROTC programs who presented the colors.

Thanks also to the UVA Sustainability office and our Balloon Brigade volunteers for collecting balloons for UVA Health Children’s today.

I would also like to offer a huge thanks to our talented staff, who work hard all year and then put in tremendous effort to make our Grounds look especially beautiful for this weekend and to make this ceremony special for all of you.

Particular thanks are due to Cecil Banks, our director of major events, and his team.

I’d also like to thank our outstanding faculty, who have served not simply as teachers and colleagues, but also as mentors and friends. Please join me in giving our staff and faculty a big round of applause.

Nearly 4,000 graduates from nine schools take part in the final day of celebrations of the UVA Class of 2025 on Sunday. (Photo by Matt Riley, University Communications)

If you will indulge me, I’d also like to ask you a favor. Today is my daughter Phebe’s birthday. I wonder if, on the count of three, you can say “Happy Birthday, Phebe”?

Speaking of family, I’d also like to take a moment to congratulate and thank all the parents and grandparents, brothers and sisters, aunts and uncles, family and friends in the audience today. Together, you have supported our students – your students – in countless ways. You have helped pay tuition, you have offered encouragement, you have fed them when they are home on break, and you have nudged them when they needed nudging.

This has been a momentous journey for everyone, including all of you. No one makes it to graduation on their own. To all the families and friends of our students: Today is your day, too, which is why I would like to ask all of our graduating students to stand, turn toward the audience, and give a round of applause to those who helped you on this journey.

And last but certainly not least, I’d like to offer my sincere congratulations and gratitude to the talented and passionate Class of 2025. You have been through highs and lows during your time at UVA, starting your first year as the effects of the pandemic lingered, and enduring the tragic shooting in 2022, which injured Mike Hollins and Marlee Morgan, who is graduating today, and cost the lives of three fellow students, Devin Chandler, Lavel Davis, Jr. and D’Sean Perry, who we remember and honor today.

You are entering a world that is uncertain and somewhat volatile, as many graduating classes have in the past. You cannot always control what happens, but you can control what you do in response. I know you will choose wisely and courageously, because you have done so time and again while on Grounds. The grace and strength of your class has held this community together through times of grief and times of celebration.

I hope and trust that you will look back on your years here as some of the most important and life-changing years of your lives, and that you will remember both the joys and the challenges. There is, after all, much joy to be found in this world, as you have already shown us. Most importantly, you have made this university a better place, and I have no doubt you will do the same for the world you are about to enter.

With that, let’s begin this honorable and joyous ceremony, through which we will welcome all of you into the worldwide community of University of Virginia graduates.

Ryan poses for a selfie with one of the newest UVA graduates. (Photo by Matt Riley, University Communications)

After remarks from guest speakers and the conferring of degrees, Ryan returned to the stage for closing comments.

Thank you to the Seven Society for that very generous and meaningful gift, which will help our students take advantage of everything UVA has to offer.

And thank you, Tatia, for your remarks. We are fortunate to have a strong and tight-knit community of alumni whose time on Grounds profoundly shaped their lives. I’m grateful that so many of those alumni have worked hard to give others the same experience.

I’d like to say a final thank you to our grand marshal, professor Beth Meyer, and to all of today’s speakers and performers.

I recognize that I am the only person standing between you and celebrating with your friends and family, which is why I will keep my final remarks to a short and crisp 45 to 60 minutes.

Actually, I have just one final and simple request for this graduating class, which is to carry this place, and this community, with you.

By that, I mean that I hope you will remember what it felt like to be here, in this place, with these people, through joy and sorrow, triumph and heartbreak, and that you will carry that feeling with you.

Ryan addresses the graduates, urging them to carry with them the feeling of being "in this place, with these people, through joy and sorrow, triumph and heartbreak." (Photo by Lathan Goumas, University Communications)

Carry with you what it felt like to be surrounded by a group of fellow students who were as compassionate as they were talented.

Carry with you what it felt like to learn from professors who loved a subject so much you couldn’t help but get excited about it, too.

Carry with you what it felt like to live with some of the best friends you have ever made, who will walk alongside you for the rest of your lives.

Carry with you the lessons you have learned here – lessons about building bridges, about getting to know people who are different from you, about remaining curious, and about doing the right thing, even when it’s hard and even when no one is watching.

Carry with you how it felt to serve others and to devote your time and energy to something bigger than yourself.

Carry with you UVA’s mission of citizen leadership and of public service, and carry what it felt like to lead selflessly and with integrity.

Carry with you how it felt to be part of an incomparably strong community.

Carry with you what it felt like to live in a community of trust and continue to live your life with honor.

For some, carry with you what it felt like to streak the Lawn, but please don’t make it a habit.

And, finally, carry with you the memory of this day, of what it felt like to walk the Lawn, knowing, above all else, that you can do hard things, because you have already done hard things.

If you remember all of this, I have no doubt that you will carry the very best of this place with you as you face, with courage and purpose, the beautiful, joyous, challenging, sometimes tragic, and inevitably surprising road ahead. And should that road ever lead you back to Charlottesville, as I hope and trust it will, please know that we will leave the lights on for you.

Congratulations, Class of 2025, and good luck.