University of Delaware
Office of Public Relations
UpDate - Vol. 16, No. 34, June 12
                                   

             More than 4,000 degrees awarded at graduation
     
     The forecast of thunderstorms and the intermittent
sprinkling of raindrops did nothing to dampen the spirits of
the nearly 3,300 members of the Class of 1997 and the 20,000-
plus family members and friends who gathered at Delaware
Stadium May 31 for the University's 148th Commencement
exercises.
     In all, approximately 4,178 degrees were awarded at the
morning ceremony, including an estimated 170 doctoral
degrees, 800 master's degrees, 3,200 bachelor's degrees and
eight associate degrees.
     Award-winning columnist and foreign correspondent
Georgie Anne Geyer offered the graduates insights she has
gathered from newsmakers around the world, in a talk
peppered with anecdotes about Israeli Prime Minister Golda
Meir, the Ayatollah Khomeini, Fidel Castro and Ronald
Reagan, among others.
     She spoke of a Jesuit friend in Chile in the 1960s,
who, in the midst of the battle between democracy and
communism, told her, "I am aware that the center is not
holding. Still I will keep on fighting. I am responsible for
my own fight, not for the outcome."
     "Those words not only seemed eminently reasonable to
me," Geyer said, "they also seemed very (to use a word I do
not particularly like) 'empowering.' Because no one can take
your own fight away from you and, often enough throughout
history, people who seemed to lose at the time turned out
later to win in the greater scheme of things. Besides,
knowing what you believe and acting upon it absolutely
convulses your enemies!"
     Knowing who you are is particularly important, Geyer
said. She told the graduates that she could work as a
foreign correspondent and feel at home everywhere in the
world because she knew who she was. "Ironically, rather than
making it difficult to understand others-or for them to
understand me-that was exactly what made it possible for all
of us to understand one another. Because we could respect
one another's souls," she said.
     Geyer wished the graduates "authenticity, self-
fulfillment, principle, the ability to know yourself and
your talent, connectedness and, of course, always, love,
which you will find if you follow what you love.
     "But, above all else, I wish you something else,
something that rationalizes and organizes all of those
qualities and which is the real secret to all the rest: To
know The Order of the Loves," she said.
     The phrase, she explained, comes from St. Augustine, to
describe "the capacityof knowing what is most important to
youwhat you love above all else and what you must place
firstif you are to be all of the person you can be as you
leave this wonderful school today and face your new lives."
     Earlier in the ceremony, President David P. Roselle
welcomed graduates and their families and friends to the
event, noting that the diverse class includes students from
41 states in the United States and 71 countries around the
world and ranging in age from 19 to 86. The graduates
included three sets of twins, seven who were celebrating
Commencement and their birthdays, and 112 Michaels and 121
Jennifers.
     Roselle said he hoped that they had achieved a greater
understanding of themselves, each other and the world beyond
at UD, and he asked them to consider that "where there is an
open mind, there will always be a frontier."
     "Keep your minds open, clear, true and with
understanding for those things, those people, those thoughts
which may be different from yours," he said, "and a way will
be open to you in all you do."