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Ronald J. Daniels
President
Go small.
Ahead of each Commencement, I grapple with what message to share with our graduating class—often gravitating toward big and weighty topics. But for the last graduating class, which had lost its first year to COVID and navigated a slew of unprecedented upheavals to reach this milestone, their ceremony seemed to demand something different.
When I brought this conundrum to my family one evening, my son Ryan suggested: "Why don't you talk about Barney?" Barney is my Boston terrier. Yes, I, too, fell prey to the pandemic puppy craze.
At first, I demurred. But then I was reminded of a significant truth learned from life with Barney: Sometimes, to meet our biggest moments, we must go small. Boston terrier–small, in fact.
I live on the Homewood campus, which was a COVID ghost town on those first walks with Barney—silent quads, empty buildings, nary a stray Hopkins Café french fry for Barney to snack on.
As COVID restrictions gradually eased, students—the Class of 2024 included—returned, reenergizing our campus. And, suddenly, along once-empty routes, there were scores of students flocking to Barney.
While he savored the attention, I savored the chance—however fleeting—to pay attention to the details of their lives, to celebrate their athletic and academic triumphs, to share in their joys, and to offer support amid inevitable moments of disappointment.
In each of those Barney-inspired interactions, I was reminded of the power of connection—of how small, serendipitous encounters like these enable us to see a person as not just another face in the crowd but as a person in full, with loves, anxieties, aspirations, fears, and passions like our own.
Such moments make us so profoundly human to one another. And so, I advised our graduates to embrace the power of those seemingly small moments: getting a dog and walking it to see whom they meet, striking up a conversation with a barista while picking up a morning coffee, or getting to know a fellow commuter waiting for the same train.
The benefits to each individual are great—but the benefits to the communities of which they are a part are even greater.
Indeed, the theme of human connection reverberated across Homewood Field on that graduation day several months ago. It was present in the remarks of our speaker, Sen. Mitt Romney, who urged our graduates to forge meaningful connections across seemingly unbridgeable differences. It was evident in the impromptu concert by one of our honorary degree recipients, musical legend Stevie Wonder. And I hope that our great, determined, resilient Class of 2024 will continue to heed the call to go small, no matter where their paths take them.
As for Barney and me, we look forward to continuing our walks around campus, meeting our newest Blue Jays, the Class of 2028, and welcoming them into this remarkable university community that will benefit from their presence, one small moment of connection at a time.
Ronald J. Daniels
President
