- My friends, please join me
in welcoming the President
of the University of Pennsylvania, Wendell Pritchett.
(crowd cheers and claps)
- Good morning.
(crowd cheers)
Here they are in Franklin Field at last,
the oft-delayed, but never deterred,
most amazing, most incredible,
Class of 2020!
(crowd cheers)
All right, you've been waiting two years for this,
you can do better than that.
Let's hear it for the Class of 2020!
(crowd cheers) All right.
All right.
Now, let me just say, you look terrific.
(crowd cheers)
Two years older,
likely, 10 times wiser.
You are undoubtedly,
the most magnificent class
to ever assemble on Franklin Field.
(crowd cheers)
Congratulations, and welcome home.
Even through the darkest days of this pandemic,
we did not doubt that this day would arrive.
We knew we would be here, ready to welcome you back.
However, there was some worry,
that maybe you would forget us.
Impossible, no?
How could you forget Penn?
But just yesterday,
our wonderful Chair of the Board of Trustees, Scott Bok,
said to me, "Wendell, they've been gone for two years,
"before that, we sent them home for the pandemic.
"Will they even remember this place, what it looks like?"
And I said, "Of course, they'll remember, they love Penn.
"They understand Penn, they know Penn.
"They're veritable Penn professionals."
But Scott wasn't sure, he wasn't sure.
He said, "I'm gonna pull out my phone
"and take a few pictures
"of a couple of typical places around campus,
"just so they can prove, you can prove, test,
"they still truly know Penn.
"And you can show the pictures, Wendell, and quiz them.
"Your last, last, last quiz at the start of your speech."
So I said, "All right, Scott."
I mean, he is my boss, so,
and what could possibly go wrong?
So, Scott loves Penn.
Scott's incredibly smart.
Scott's a wonderful guy,
but here's one thing you have to know.
Can I have the first picture, please.
Scott has a wicked sense a humor.
Okay, so Penn professionals, where are we?
Call it out.
(audience shouts answers)
I don't know,
two years away.
What is it?
All right, let's see the picture.
There you go.
Good job, we're on the bench with Ben.
That was Ben Franklin's frock coat and sleeve button.
All right, next picture.
Where are we, huh, huh?
It sounds a little hazy.
Maybe it'd be the heat, might be the heat.
I hear a couple of people sayin' it.
All right, what is it?
All right, some of you got it right.
We're beneath the button, the heart of Penn.
All right, how about this one?
(audience shouts responses)
What is it?
I don't know.
I'm not hearing a lot of shouting,
not a lot of confidence out there.
(audience shouts answers)
All right, I hear a couple at least.
All right, let's show everybody what it is.
The mascot, all right.
We're home again in the company of dear friends.
Now, just one more.
Where are we now?
(audience shouts answers)
All right, again,
I'm hearin' a few people who are willing to take a chance.
Let's see it.
Franklin Field, right here,
historic Franklin Field,
the oldest collegiate football stadium in the country.
You all know that from Quizzo.
Home to the renowned Penn Relays,
site of the first ever radio broadcast
of a football game in 1922, you might not know that,
and the locale for generations of toasts,
toasts to dear old Penn.
Two years ago, at your virtual commencement ceremony,
we reminded you that this is also the place,
where nearly 90 years ago,
President Franklin Delano Roosevelt
spoke these prophetic words
in accepting his party's nomination
to run for a second term as president.
- [Franklin] There is a mysterious cycle in human events.
To some generations, much is given,
of other generations, much is expected.
This generation of Americans has a rendezvous with destiny.
- So,
at that time of the speech,
in 1936,
our nation was challenged with economic and social upheaval,
the likes of which never before had been seen.
In Europe, the winds of war were blowing.
The world's very future was at stake.
President Roosevelt ended his acceptance speech,
declaring the nation was not just battling a depression,
but actually at war for the survival of Democracy.
"We are fighting to save
"a great and precious form of government," he said,
"for ourselves and for the world."
Now, how far that seems today, and yet, how very close.
Two years ago,
in your family living room, or apartment room,
or wherever you attended your online commencement,
the world seemed totally upside down.
You had bravely and resolutely soldiered
through two long months of pandemic restrictions,
and in that moment, we all wondered,
how much longer can this go on?
I remember that.
None of us fully appreciated how readily
two months would turn into two years,
with still no definitive end to the pandemic in sight.
Young, healthy, in the primes of our lives,
we still often did not truly expect to encounter death,
as so many of us now have.
We could not foresee how bitterly contested
the presidential election of 2020 would become.
We expected the final conclusion would come
with one candidate gracefully conceding to the other.
The site of a violent insurrection, storming the capital,
attempting to overthrow the vote of the people by force
was simply unimaginable.
And today, in Europe, once again,
the winds of war are blowing.
Think now of President Roosevelt's words,
spoken on this very location, 86 years ago.
"It is a war for the survival of democracy.
"We are fighting to save a great
and precious form of government,
"for ourselves and for the world."
A rendezvous with destiny sounds exciting and romantic,
until you're forced to live through it.
If we are honest with ourselves today,
we must concede,
that the past two years have been disorienting,
and dismaying, and sometimes, downright frightening,
and yet, I say this with absolute conviction,
we are not disheartened.
We are not discouraged.
We will not despair.
This amazing Class of 2020
gives us unbridled hope for the future.
You are the generation of which much is expected,
and you unequivocally have proven yourselves
fully up to the task.
From the outset, you have done what needed to be done.
You have met every challenge.
You have overcome each obstacle.
You have remained calm.
You have carried on.
You have found within yourselves
stores of resourcefulness and resilience
you would not have known were there,
until you were forced to call upon them.
Three years ago, in the halcyon days of 2019,
you did not worry about saving lives preventatively
or preserving democracy perpetually
for the peace and security of future generations,
but such has been your lie.
You have been called, not once, but repeatedly,
to step up, to stand forth, to stay the course calmly,
through storm and turmoil.
Standing with you here today,
none of us can truly say
when these demands of service and sacrifice
and extraordinary effort will come to an end,
nor is it possible to know
what great concerns will challenge us
these three years or three decades from now.
But we know this,
because we've learned this from you
and at the hand of hard experience, best not to do it alone,
community counts.
We are in this together,
and it is only from one another and with one another,
that we can truly hope to survive and thrive.
This will always distinguish you from any other class,
the deep bonds of human connection,
forged in times of adversity.
You will always be one band,
bound together by your shared experiences and sacrifices,
yet I can confidently predict,
that what today has been a burden,
tomorrow will seem a gift.
It will help you succeed and grow
and make a difference for all your days.
There is a tradition, that goes back many years at Penn,
that when we come to this point in the program,
the president concludes by asking the audience
to stand and, by applause,
show their great appreciation of the graduates.
Today, this tradition never seems more apt,
more appropriate, more warranted.
So, Classes of '20 and '21, please remain seated.
Family members, friends, guests, members of the faculty,
and all here with me on the dais today,
I ask you to stand with me.
(audience cheers and applauds)
Today is a day of celebration.
Today, we honor an amazing group of young people,
who in so little time have already given so much.
Congratulations, Class of 2020 and 2021.
(audience cheers and applauds)