September
5, 2003
Celebrating
Convocation 2003
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Photo:
Fred LeBlanc
Frances
Perkins Scholars celebrate the “beginning of the end”
of their tenure at the College.
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Blue lipstick, blue
cowboy hats, blue leis, and even a dash of blue in the otherwise
leaden skies brightened the festivities as the Mount Holyoke community
gathered in Gettell Amphitheater on Wednesday, September 3, to
celebrate convocation, the formal beginning of the College’s
167th academic year. Adorned with blue wigs, blue umbrellas, and
all manner of things blue, their class color, the class of 2004
processed in to the cheers of faculty, staff, and fellow students.
After the ceremonies came time for another celebration, as President
Joanne V. Creighton cut a ribbon to mark the dedication of the
reopened Blanchard Campus Center.
Creighton welcomed
new and returning members of the community, offering particular
congratulations and best wishes to the class of 2004. Focusing
her remarks on the legacies of the College’s founder, Mary
Lyon, she noted that convocation is also a time for paying attention
to “the sustaining presence and permanence of Mount Holyoke
College itself.”
“The most obvious
legacy of Mary Lyon is the place itself: this beautiful campus,”
Creighton said. “She knew that the seminary of her dreams
needed physical presence if it were to have permanence. When the
cornerstone of Mount Holyoke was laid on October 3, 1836, Mary
Lyon wrote memorably: ‘stone and bricks and mortar speak
a language that vibrates in my very soul.’”
Creighton invited
the community to celebrate the most recent fruits of The Plan
for Mount Holyoke 2003: the reconstruction of Shattuck and
Cleveland halls that brings the science center to completion,
the renovation of Wilder Hall, and “the magnificant Blanchard.
I can’t help but think that Mary would be pleased with this
center, because one of the legacies that we owe her is the centeredness
of the institution that comes not only from sense of place, but
a sense of purpose as well.” She saluted the College’s
facilities management workers for their “heroic work”
in bringing the ambitious projects to completion.
Patricia Serio, administrative
assistant in the Speaking, Arguing, and Writing Program of the
Weissman Center for Leadership and representative of the Staff
Council, encouraged students to avail themselves of the experience
and talents of the College’s staff. “We want your
experience here to be everything you hope it will be,” she
said. Also offering remarks were Kate Mulligan ’04, president
of the Student Govern-ment Association, and Lee Bowie, professor
of philosophy and dean of the College.
Mulligan asked her
fellow students to take time this year to let her know “what
you love about Mount Holyoke and… what you want to make
better for the next generation of students here. The Plan for
2010 is an excellent blueprint for long-term goals and influential
changes that will be monumental for this College,” she said,
referring to the recently completed planning document, the successor
to The Plan for Mount Holyoke 2003. “But I also want you
to think about the little things, because it’s the little
things that make this place so special.”
Bowie encouraged the
students to reject neatness and orderliness as ideals, and to
“cultivate a certain studied messiness” on their desks
and in their minds, resisting easy categorization and simple solutions.
“My favorite definition of intelligence is ‘the ability
to tolerate ambiguity,’” Bowie said, encouraging students
to learn to “hold ideas in creative tension.”
“It is better
to be creatively confused,” he counseled, “than stupidly
clear.”
The M & Cs, a
student a cappella group, performed the Supremes’ “Up
the Ladder to the Roof,” and opening and closing prayers
were offered by the Reverend Andrea Ayvazian, dean of religious
and spiritual life, and Rabbi Lisa Freitag-Keshet, chaplain and
adviser to the Jewish community.
After convocation,
it was time for a community picnic on Skinner Green and the cutting
of a ribbon—blue, appropriately —to mark the official
opening of Blanchard. Joining Creighton in offering remarks were
John Bryant, director of facilities management; Rochelle Calhoun,
executive director of the Mount Holyoke Alumnae Association; and
John Laprade, manager of Blanchard and director of student programs.
“I invite you
to use it, to inhabit it, to enliven it,” Laprade said.
“Come here to relax, to study, to dine, to meet. Come to
the art gallery, and come to the many performances and events
that will be held here. I invite you to create the program of
this building, and to bring it to life. It’s our campus
center; it’s the new hub of our campus culture in our community.
Enjoy it.”
The
counter is
1,237
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