Commencement Address

Michelle Obama
categories: Commencement Address, Speeches
YouTube "Dear Class of 2020" Event - June 7, 2020
June 7, 2020
Hey, everybody. It is an honor to be here with you to help celebrate this amazing milestone in your lives. Graduation from college or high school is a culmination of years of hard work, so please enjoy this moment. You deserve this celebration. Congratulations. This is an important time of transition. In light of the current state of our country, I struggle to find the right words of wisdom for you today, so I am here today to talk to you not as the former First Lady, but as a […]
Condoleezza Rice
categories: Commencement Address, Speeches
YouTube "Dear Class of 2020" Event - June 7, 2020
June 7, 2020
Congratulations class of 2020 on a well-deserved and long-awaited recognition. As a professor, I am always delighted to see students honored for their hard work and today is no exception. Still, this celebration is unusual. It is not the one that you imagined or anticipated or dreamed about, but you can be especially proud of what it represents: your ingenuity and relentlessness and that of your teachers, families, and friends in challenging, sometimes tragic, and unprecedented times. Commencement, someone once said, is a funny thing to call the end. That […]
Joni Ernst
categories: Commencement Address, Speeches
Class of 2020 Commencement Address - May 23, 2020
May 23, 2020
Hello everyone. I wanted to take a moment to offer my congratulations to the class of 2020. You did it, you made it, and a huge congratulations is in order. You should all be extremely proud of yourselves and you deserve a lot of credit as does the community around you. Whether that be the friends, family, neighbors or teachers who were with you all along the way. So, make sure that you take a moment to show gratitude toward the people who helped you get here today. Thank your […]
Barbara Roberts
categories: Commencement Address, Speeches
Portland State University Commencement Address - June 16, 2007
June 16, 2007
Well thank you so much for this great honor. I am both elated and humbled to be recognized by Portland State University. Many, many years ago I took my very first college night school classes at the Portland State Extension Center. Years later I fell in love with and married one of Portland State's founding faculty members, Dr. Frank Roberts. From Vanport College until his retirement, Frank taught 37 years for this wonderful institution. Finally after my time as governor and at Harvard University, I came home to Oregon and […]
Malala Yousafzai
categories: Commencement Address, Speeches
Class of 2020 Commencement Address - May 16, 2020
May 16, 2020
To all the graduates of 2020, like all of you, I am also missing my graduation ceremony this year. And we are not alone. Across the world, COVID-19 has forced more than 1 billion students out of school. But for most of us, this is temporary. We will continue our education and follow our dreams. But many girls, especially in developing countries, may never return to the classroom. Because of this crisis, they will be forced into early marriages or low-paying jobs to support their families. And when schools reopen, […]
Oprah Winfrey
categories: Commencement Address, Speeches
2020 Commencement Address - May 15, 2020
May 15, 2020
Hello everyone. I know you may not feel like it, but you are indeed the chosen class for such a time as this, the class of 2020. You're also a united class, the pandemic class, that has the entire world striving to graduate with you. Of course, this is not the graduation ceremony you envisioned. You've been dreaming about that walk across the stage, your family and friends cheering you on: 'Whoop, whoop!' The caps flung joyously in the air. But even though there might not be pomp because of […]
Hillary Rodham Clinton
categories: Commencement Address, Speeches
iHeartRadio “Commencement: Speeches for the Class of 2020” Podcast - May 15, 2020
May 15, 2020
Graduates, friends, and families, and newly-minted Zoom experts, congratulations on this milestone in your life’s journey. When I was first asked to offer these commencement remarks in the midst of the global pandemic, I was hesitant. In this unprecedented time, what can anyone say about the future to the class of 2020? Then I thought back to my own graduation in the midst of the Vietnam War, the assassinations of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. and Senator Robert Kennedy, riots in our streets, and an overall sense of confusion and […]
Christine Lagarde
categories: Commencement Address, Speeches
Claremont McKenna College Commencement Address - May 12, 2018
May 12, 2018
Lagarde's address begins at 43:52 in the video. GOOD AFTERNOON TO ALL OF YOU. AND THANK YOU, DANIEL. I'VE BEEN SPEAKING AFTER PRESIDENTS, PRIME MINISTERS, DIGNITARIES OF ALL SORTS, AND EVEN CELEBRITIES AT TIMES, BUT TO SPEAK AFTER SOMEBODY WHO HAS BEEN A JEOPARDY CONTESTANT, THAT – NEVER. SO YES. [APPLAUDING, AUDIENCE LAUGHTER AND APPLAUSE] TO PRESIDENT CHODOSH, TO TRUSTEES, TO FACULTY MEMBERS AND TO THE ADMINISTRATION – THANK YOU FOR INVITING ME TODAY AND MAKING SUCH A SUNNY DAY, FOR THE POOR WASHINGTON-BASED NORMAN NATIONAL THAT I AM. TO […]
Melinda Gates
categories: Commencement Address, Speeches
Commencement Address at Stanford University - June 15, 2014
June 15, 2014
BILL GATES: Congratulations, Class of 2014! Melinda and I are excited to be here. It would be a thrill for anyone to be invited to speak at a Stanford Commencement – but it's especially gratifying for us. Stanford is rapidly becoming the favorite university for members of our family. And it's long been a favorite university for Microsoft and our foundation. Our formula has been to get the smartest, most creative people working on the most important problems. It turns out that a disproportionate number of those people are at […]
Melinda Gates
categories: Commencement Address, Speeches
Duke Commencement Address – May 12, 2013
May 12, 2013
President Brodhead, Trustees, and members of the Duke University Community – it is so fantastic to be back here at my alma mater. I'm really grateful for the honorary degree, and I'm especially grateful to be able to address the graduating class. So let me start by saying to those of you graduating today in 2013 – congratulations. And let me remind you to thank your mothers – today is Mother's Day – and to say that I’m still bitter about the Louisville game. I was a student here in […]