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Oprah’s 2020 Commencement Tries to Make Up for Lost Traditions Oprah to Class of 2020: ‘What Will Your Essential Service Be?’
(about 3 hours later)
Hugging friends? Nope. Group photos with grandparents? Unlikely. Tossing caps in the air? Perhaps, if you can find one, but please make sure they don’t hit the ceiling. Hugging friends? Nope. Class photos? Afraid not. Instead, in place of the usual pomp and circumstance, Oprah Winfrey on Friday asked America’s graduates — the “pandemic class,” she called them — to consider what their “essential service” in this world will be.
As high school and college come to an end for the Class of 2020, the coronavirus has upended the traditional celebrations that accompany those milestones. The online commencement ceremony, hosted by Facebook and featuring scores of celebrities, was one of several this week that will replace stage walks and cap tosses for the nation’s nearly 3.7 million high school seniors and some 3 million college graduates.
Instead of walking across a stage to cheers, the nation’s nearly 3.7 million high school seniors and some 3 million college graduates will receive their diplomas in the mail or on their phones. And commencement speakers will offer life advice through a webcam, instead of looking across a sea of smiling graduates. With a critical phase of their lives upended by the pandemic, the class of 2020 will receive their diplomas in the mail or on their phones. Recognizing the need to offer extra inspiration, big names have made even more appearances than usual as commencement speakers this year — via webcams, instead of onstage — including the actor and coronavirus survivor Tom Hanks.
But because of the disruption, this year’s crop of speakers and well-wishers include some of America’s biggest celebrities, appearing in virtual ceremonies in an effort to ease the sting of the lost pomp and circumstance. He told graduates at Wright State University in Dayton, Ohio, that their lives would be marked by the pandemic in the same way that previous generations experienced wars.
Oprah Winfrey is offering a commencement speech in a live-streamed celebration hosted by Facebook, which began just after 2:30 p.m. on Friday. More than 75 other celebrities are joining her — virtually — from Selena Gomez to Amy Schumer to Cardi B. The new normal will continue on Saturday, when former President Barack Obama will give two commencement addresses, the first at 2 p.m. for graduates of historically black colleges and universities, and another in prime time for high school graduates, airing on all the major television networks.
Mindy Kaling and B.J. Novak, former co-stars of “The Office,” are hosting the event, and several others are scheduled to share “words of wisdom,” including Simone Biles, the Olympic gymnast; Lil Nas X, the rapper and singer; Awkwafina, the rapper-turned-actress; and Jennifer Garner, the actress. Miley Cyrus will perform. On Friday, Ms. Winfrey challenged graduates to not just rebuild society after the pandemic, but to create a more just world as the nation recovers. And as many graduates look warily at the grim job market, she highlighted the service of essential workers, and asked graduates to contemplate how they will use their own passions to benefit those around them.
The live-streamed ceremony includes photographs and videos of graduating seniors from across the country, as well as messages from college deans and high school principals. She also made an apparent reference to the killing of Ahmaud Arbery, a 25-year-old black man in Georgia whose death in February led to murder charges last week.
“For every person burdened by bias and bigotry, for every black man and woman living in their American skin, fearful to even go for a jog, inequality is a pre-existing condition,” Ms. Winfrey said.
Next month, Ms. Winfrey will also headline a graduation ceremony for high school seniors in Chicago, where she filmed her top-rated talk show for more than two decades.Next month, Ms. Winfrey will also headline a graduation ceremony for high school seniors in Chicago, where she filmed her top-rated talk show for more than two decades.
On Saturday, former President Barack Obama is scheduled to give two commencement speeches, the first at 2 p.m. for graduates of historically black colleges and universities, and another in an 8 p.m. prime time special for high school graduates airing on all the major television networks. Here are Ms. Winfrey’s remarks from the Facebook event, in full:
Mr. Obama is also scheduled to speak at a commencement hosted by YouTube on June 6, along with Michelle Obama, Lady Gaga, Alicia Keys and the K-pop group BTS. Hello everyone.
Other prominent graduation speakers this year include the actor Tom Hanks, who survived infection with the coronavirus and told graduates at Wright State University in Dayton, Ohio, that their lives would be marked by the pandemic in the same way that previous generations experienced wars. 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 — woop! woop! — the caps flung joyously in the air. But even though there may not be pomp because of our circumstances, never has a graduating class been called to step into the future with more purpose, vision, passion, and energy and hope.
President Trump plans to address graduating cadets at West Point on June 13. Unlike other commencements, this one will be in person, with the academy summoning 1,000 cadets back for the event. Your graduation ceremony is taking place with so many luminaries celebrating you on the world’s Facebook stage. I’m just honored to join them and salute you. You know, the word “graduate” comes from the Latin gradus, meaning “a step toward something,” and in the early 15th century, “graduation” was a term used in alchemy to mean a tempering or refining. Every one of us is now being called to graduate, to step toward something, even though we don’t know what. Every one of us is likewise now being called to temper the parts of ourselves that must fall away, to refine who we are, how we define success and what is genuinely meaningful. And you, the real graduates on this day, you will lead us.
Former Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr., the presumptive Democratic nominee to face Mr. Trump in November, is scheduled to speak virtually to Columbia University law school graduates, while House Speaker Nancy Pelosi will give a speech for Smith College in Massachusetts. I wish I could tell you I know the path forward. I don’t. There is so much uncertainty. In truth, there always has been. What I do know is that the same guts and imagination that got you to this moment — all those things are the very things that are going to sustain you through whatever is coming. It’s vital that you learn, and we all learn, to be at peace with the discomfort of stepping into the unknown. It’s really OK to not have all the answers. The answers will come for sure, if you can accept not knowing long enough to get still and stay still long enough for new thoughts to take root in your more quiet, deeper, truer self. The noise of the world drowns out the sound of you. You have to get still to listen.
So can you use this disorder that Covid-19 has wrought? Can you treat it as an uninvited guest that’s come into our midst to reorder our way of being. Can you, the class of 2020, show us not how to put the pieces back together again, but how to create a new and more evolved normal, a world more just, kind, beautiful, tender, luminous, creative, whole. We need you to do this, because the pandemic has illuminated the vast systemic inequities that have defined life for too many for too long. For poor communities without adequate access to health care, inequality is a pre-existing condition. For immigrant communities forced to hide in the shadows, inequality is a pre-existing condition. For incarcerated people, with no ability to social distance, inequality is a pre-existing condition. For every person burdened by bias and bigotry, for every black man and woman living in their American skin, fearful to even go for a jog, inequality is a pre-existing condition. You have the power to stand for, to fight for, and vote for healthier conditions that will create a healthier society. This moment is your invitation to use your education to begin to heal our afflictions by applying the best of what you’ve learned in your head, and felt in your heart. This moment has shown us what Dr. King tried to tell us. Decades ago, he understood that “we are caught in an inescapable network of mutuality, tied into a single garment of destiny.” That’s what he said.
Whatever affects one directly affects all indirectly. If humanity is a global body, every soul is a cell in that body, and we are being challenged like never before to keep the global body healthy by keeping ourselves healthy in mind and body and spirit. As all the traditions affirm, the deepest self-care is at once caring for the human family. And we see this so clearly with essential workers. Look who turns out to be essential: teachers — your teachers, health care workers of course, the people stocking grocery shelves, the cashiers, the truck drivers, food providers, those who are caring for your grandparents, those who clean the places where we work and shop and carry out our daily lives. We are all here because they, at great and profound risk, are still providing their essential service. What will your essential service be? What really matters to you? The fact that you’re alive means you’ve been given a reprieve to think deeply about that question. How will you use what matters in service to yourself, your community and the world?
For me, it’s always been talking and sharing stories. For you, well, that’s for you to discover. And my hope is that you will harness your education, your creativity and your valor, your voice, your vote — reflecting on all that you’ve witnessed and hungered for, all that you know to be true — and use it to create more equity, more justice and more joy in the world. To be the class that commenced a new way forward, the class of 2020. Bravo. Brava, brava, brava.