On May 5th, I attended the Vermont Technical College Commencement. It being my first at Vermont Tech, there was a natural charge, but it got me to thinking about all of the official college events I’ve been to over the nine years I’ve been in higher education.
When I worked at Norwich University, there was Convocation, Commencement, all kinds of celebratory events and weekly parades, due to NU being a military college. (I do miss the parades.) When I worked at Goddard College, I attended more than 30 opening sessions and 30 graduations, since nearly each program had its own residency. At Vermont Tech, I’m getting back into the routine of a residential campus and the traditional touch points of an academic year.
So, at Commencement, I was aware that this would not be my last and that I have many more Honors Convocations, apprenticeship graduations, opening Convocations and other events that I’ll be attending in the coming years. I wondered how I’ve been able to keep any freshness whatsoever in my career in higher education and, more importantly, how I’d preserve that for the long haul.
I’m not certain the families or the students know how much work – or how repetitive – it can be year after year. Chairs? Check. Sound system? Check. Same food as last year? No, let’s try something different. Who has the script? Can we distribute maps? How many programs? What’s the newspaper deadline for the graduate list? And the deadline for the follow-up photos? What kind of frames are the awards going in? The preparation happens year-round for the one day of Commencement alone.
On this day, I met a grandfather, himself a Vermont Tech alumnus, there for his granddaughter’s graduation. Then I met an old acquaintance there for a niece’s graduation. Then I saw a family crying with joy and hugging their graduate. Then I felt the nervous energy of the graduates and saw that familiar look on their faces.
What keeps these events fresh, for me, is that they are so obviously a turning point in a person’s life. Years of work or months of study are finally paying off. In the midst of a semester, they’re admitted into an honor society. At the end of two or four years, their families can gather around the first member of their family to graduate from college. A colleague shows up as a surprise and suddenly a non-traditional student knows that everyone in the office has been rooting for her these last few years.
Sometimes I find myself looking for just that one person crying to remind myself that I’m in higher education for deeply meaningful reasons!
Finding this freshness – or the deep meaning – has become more and more important as I’ve moved from student life to academics to marketing in higher education. I’m a bit removed from the joys and struggles that happen once a student is recruited and enrolled. So maybe these events are touch points for me too, reminding me of the magic in the hard work, growth and learning in the pursuit of a degree.
Photo credit: John Walker