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Remembering Commencement 2009
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May 17, 2009
As proud families and friends watched, approximately 370 students received their diplomas during the College's 116th Commencement on May 17 on Marston Quad.
In his charge to the Class of 2009, Pomona College President David W. Oxtoby
looked to Malcolm Gladwell's book The Tipping Point for
inspiration for the students, referencing recent events and
current issues like the 2008 election and climate change. President Oxtoby offered this
hope for the graduates when they come upon future tipping
points:
“Tipping points involve a certain degree of chance. But they also involve being prepared to respond to a situation with potential, as well as being ready to think strategically and to use social networks to build momentum for a cause. I hope and trust that your Pomona College education has prepared you for just this purpose.”
Alix Coupet ’09 and Julie Tate '09 gave the student speeches.
Professor Frederick Sontag was presented the Trustees' Medal
of Merit by Stewart R. Smith '68, chairman of the Board of
Trustees. Sontag arrived in Claremont in 1952 as a
philosophy professor and the nature and breadth of his special interests—metaphysics, philosophy of religion, philosophical psychology, existentialism, and philosophical theology—are brilliantly reflected in the profoundly influential life he has led. He has
written nearly 30 scholarly books, while contributing almost 100 essays and articles to major publications and more than 300 articles and opinion pieces to professional journals, magazines, and newspapers.
His name is honored at Pomona with a research fellowship
fund and the Sontag Greek Theatre.
 New York Times columnist Bob Herbert delivered the keynote address and
received an honorary degree. As an op-ed columnist since
1993, Herbert writes twice a week on politics, urban affairs
and social trends. He was a national correspondent for NBC
in the early 1990s, and worked at The Daily News for
many years previous to that. He has taught journalism at
Brooklyn College and the Columbia University School of
Journalism, and has won numerous awards, including the
American Society of newspaper Editors award for
distinguished newspaper writing. In 2005, he published
Promised Betrayed: Waking Up from the American Dream.
Read Bob Herbert's Commencement
speech
Honorary degrees were also awarded to:
-- Mary Schmich '75 has worked as a journalist at the Peninsula Times
Tribune in Palo Alto, the Orlando Sentinel and,
since 1985, the Chicago Tribune. She's been writing three columns each week since 1992--except
for a year spent at Harvard on a Nieman Fellowship for journalists--on topics ranging from humorous reflections
on birthday greetings to serious reporting on the demolition of the Cabrini-Green housing project. For 25 years, she has moonlighted
as the writer of the "Brenda Starr" comic strip.
She experienced a brief spate of worldwide fame when a 1997 column, "Wear Sunscreen," a collection of wry advice to college graduates,
was emailed around the nation, mistakenly identified as an MIT commencement speech. The column became an internet favorite,
and she shared it with our 2009 graduates at Commencement.
-- Luis Valdez is regarded as one of the most important and influential
American playwrights. His play Zoot Suit, which had a
successful run here at Pomona in both 2008 and 2009, is
considered a masterpiece of the American theater as well as
the first Chicano play to appear on Broadway and the first
Chicano major feature film. His company, El Teatro Campesino
(The Farm Workers' Theatre), was founded in 1965 and is the
most distinguished and longest-running Chicano theatre in
the United States.
His many feature films and television credits include the
hit film La Bamba, Cisco Kid and Corridos:
Tales of Passion and Revolution. He has won countless
awards, including the prestigious Peabody Award for
excellence in television. In 2007 he was one of 50 artists
to be awarded a Rockefeller Fellowship. His latest
anthology, Mummified Deer and Other Plays, was
recently published. Read Luis
Valdez's Commencement speech
A new element was added to the Commencement ceremony this
year: an artful and and sustainable canopy to utilizing
art, science and mathematics to provide shade for graduates.
Read more and view a slideshow of the canopy construction process...
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