The Aurora State College of Technology (ASCOT) held its 13th Commencement Exercises last April 9. The Guest of Honor and Commencement Speaker was Dr. Rafe M. Brown, Assistant Professor of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology and Assistant Curator of Herpetology at the University of Kansas, USA. Dr. Brown has been working on different environmental researches in the country in collaboration with the National Museum. This is his second time in Aurora.
Here’s the transcript of his Commencement Address:
Greetings friends,
It is a pleasure to be here on this beautiful day and a great honor for me to be invited to speak at this important event.
Today, you are graduating and leaving behind an extremely important period of your life and your personal development. When I think of the importance of higher education and the great significance of a student’s college career, my first thought is that the last four years have, in many ways, been some of the most important years of your life. You have learned to work hard, to take your required class assignments seriously, and you have hopefully come to appreciate what others in your society will expect of you as adults. As an adult you have learned that aside from the great fun and pleasure you can derive from life and its distractions, you also have great responsibility.
As a graduating senior, you are now part of something much bigger than yourself. The many institutions of college – your clubs, your fraternities, your graduating class, and now your association as an alumnus – all make you part of something. When I look this graduating class, it occurs to me that you are now all members of society in a way that you were not before today.
