Head of School Remarks at Class of 2020 Graduation

The following remarks were given by Head of School Tom Gibian at the Class of 2020 Virtual Graduation Ceremony on June 6, 2020. 

Welcome everyone to our graduation ceremony honoring the Sandy Spring Friends School Class of 2020. I want to recognize the parents and family members, the grandfriends and neighbors, the brothers and sisters and, of course, the incredible faculty who have zoomed today to celebrate these young people who have earned not just a diploma from Sandy Spring Friends School but our respect and gratitude. Each of you, all members of the Class of 2020, have argued with us, debated us, irritated us, made us laugh, pointed out our mistakes, given us pause, amazed us, improved our minds—and now, you carry our hopes.

For the Class of 2020, our time together at Sandy Spring Friends School (as is true of all graduating classes) continues until—it doesn’t. This year was different, though. We have been transitioning through a series of phases, physically separated and virtually together, roller coastering through ups and downs that have left us breathless, hopeful, disappointed, resigned, grateful, confused, belligerent, contemplative, angry, amazed, lonely, bored, innovative, exasperated, focused, and wondering when the hell can we go outside.

And you made it. Intact, in one piece, beaming, anxious to move on, more sure about where to go then when you will go there, wondering what your folks will do when you are no longer living with them and looking forward to when we can get as many of us together as possible to hold a proper graduation ceremony with all of the trappings because while the virtual variety is better than nothing it is not what you signed up for.

Our promise to you is that we will have that ceremony. It will be physical, analogue, on campus, special. We can sign each other’s yearbooks and have a strawberry cowbake. It will be the ceremony that you, your families, and all those who care about you want and deserve.

In exchange, I would like to extract a promise from you—a big one. Change the world. Sounds like a lot? Fair enough.

Ok, I will offer you two clues to help you get started. The first one is easy and, as they say on Sesame Street, is brought to you by the letter “S.” “S” stands for science.

The world is finite. That’s it. That’s the clue. We can change it only so much, pollute it only so much, populate it only so much, extract from it only so much before it changes in unpredictable and consequential ways. We can observe these things, measure these things, analyze these things, generate and interpret the data, replicate it, peer review it, reflect on it and then we must act.

Let’s hope that your children will find it hard to believe that for 100 years people drove cars that were powered by combusting fossil derived fuels that choked our cities with smog, sparked violent conflict in the countries where it was sourced, spurred massive corruption among incumbent rulers elected or not, and materially contributed to climate disruption. Just like we find it hard to believe that for the 100 years before that, much of the world was powered by whale oil.

Yes, “S” is for science, which is a beautiful thing because while the world is finite our capacity to deepen our understanding of it is infinite—or at least bottomless. I am not advocating that we all be employed as scientists; largely because I would never want to deprive the world of poets, artists, saxophone players, and other essential workers. So I am only asking that we all leave room to understand science.

The example in front of us today: a particular and unique bug. In fact it isn’t even a bug. It’s a virus that we (humanity) can opt to protect ourselves from through the scientific method. By choosing science we see in real time how our understanding of the world deepens because tomorrow we will know more than today, not because we are unknowing or unwise today but because we will build on the knowledge we have acquired. When we do this, we are brought closer together.

I said that I would offer two clues. Sandy Spring Friends School prepared you to think. I have asked you to change the world and given you a clue that the world is finite. Now, I am asking you to redefine the meaning of success—another “S.” I am asking you to question what success— real, meaningful, soul satisfying success—means for you and for society. I am not going to be prescriptive. My generation has not earned that right. It is just that this class, all of you, has already questioned, persisted, experienced loss, come together, cried, laughed, and loved in a way and to a degree that allows me to think that you can do anything.

So do this. Live lives of meaning that contribute to making the world a world you want to live in. Live lives of meaning that allow you to be known far and wide as having a reputation for integrity and truthfulness, that involve offering and being offered uncountable kindnesses, that recognize that every human being is part of your family. Live lives of meaning that accumulate wisdom and that reflect a delicious humility because you have remained aware that the learning and growing, the lifelong deepening of understanding, is only possible because before today our understanding was less complete then it will be tomorrow.

In this way, we learn the folly of shaming someone for where they are on their journey. Including ourselves. This is what I mean by humility. Keeping this thought in mind, I am not asking you to change the world when it is convenient or when you have a little more bandwidth. A sense of urgency is in order and we can begin today to be more keenly aware, more altruistic, more embracing of Dr. Martin Luther King’s words smuggled out of the Birmingham Jail: “Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere. We are caught in an inescapable network of mutuality, tied in a single garment of destiny. Whatever affects one directly, affects all indirectly.”

So to review, my ask is that you change the world; the first clue is that the world is finite and the second is that you must redefine the meaning of success. Since you are all Sandy Spring Friends School graduates, please rely on your Quaker powers of knowing that while the world is finite your capacity for understanding it is not; and that by defining success expansively you will be bringing healing light into the world.

Now, as is my wont, I am going to turn my remarks back to your parents and to your younger siblings and the others who are here today and who love you and, therefore, are anticipating the day in the not too distant future when you will leave them and you will be excited and a little sad and they will be excited and inconsolably sad. This is good and as it should be, biologically speaking. These are our young. It is imperative that they separate. It can no longer be postponed. Sandy Spring graduates, please show some compassion; it is not easy for your families to let you go and, truth be told, it is not easy for me either.

Parents, you have done well. You have had opportunities to watch as your children have walked their paths and you have, mostly, resisted the urge to clear the way of obstacles and challenges. Now, because you did not prepare the path for your child but, instead, prepared your child for the path, the Class of 2020 is ready for the future.

Robert Frost described home as “the place where, when you have to go there, they have to take you in.” Seniors, I mean graduates, the Sandy Spring Friends School community is also your home. We will miss you, we will think of you often, and you will always be welcomed. We will keep the porch light on for you.

Thank you.