A Friendship Leads to a Memorable Commencement Speech
In 2007, Commencement speakers Ana Maria Tapia de Mitchell and Kate Butler showed how Excelsior University brings people together.
The two graduates had met during their studies through Excelsior’s Electronic Peer Network, where students bought and sold used books. Tapia de Mitchell had just completed a course and was selling her textbooks, and Butler bought them. They soon discovered they both were in their 50s and had four children, and over the course of their time with Excelsior, they often encouraged and commiserated with each other.
At Commencement, the two spoke together to deliver a graduation speech marking the first and so far only time two people teamed up to deliver graduate remarks. They talked about how one lived in Albany, New York, and one lived in Houston, Texas, and that they had just met in person for the first time, and how they both shared the dream of earning their degree.
“In our lives, we have all undoubtedly fallen down many times. But the fact that we are all here today means that, each and every time, we stood back up.”
Toward the end of their speech, Butler said, “Shortly after I began working on my degree at Excelsior, I went out to dinner with friends at a Chinese restaurant. Inside my fortune cookie was an old Chinese proverb that I still carry in my wallet today. It said, ‘Fall down seven times; stand up eight.’ We are not a graduating class of young college students, poised on the brink of adulthood. We are adults who have lived diverse lives, who have accomplished much, and will accomplish more. In our lives, we have all undoubtedly fallen down many times. But the fact that we are all here today means that, each and every time, we stood back up. And so, to the Class of 2007, wherever you are, here in this room or halfway across the world, please join us in standing up together—as the Excelsior College Class of 2007.”
Tapia de Mitchell and Butler concluded their remarks by stating in unison: “Congratulations!”
