Bienvenue
Benvenuto
Boa vinda (Portuguese)
Bienvenido
Tashi delek (Dzongka)
Swaagatam (Hindi)
Dobro pozhalovat (Russian)
Yin dee (Thai)
Dobro došli (Croatian)
Swagatam (Nepali) 
Tere tulemast (Estonia)
Huan yin (Chinese)
Velkommen (Danish)
Sondzela
Bruchim habayim
Bruchot haba'ot
Titambirei
Welcome

And thank you all for making the effort to share this day with these soon-to-be graduates of College of the Atlantic.

For those of you who have been remote from this place over that last however many years your favorite 2007 graduate has been here, this place can be hard to understand.

For those of you who have spent the last however many years you have been here, here, this place can be hard to understand.

To shed a little bit of light on the college and these beautiful shining faces, I'd like to try and paint a picture of diversity here at College of the Atlantic. To begin I would like you all to be aware that these soon-to-be graduates have changed nationalities twice in the last week. Last Friday, senior projects were due at 4 p.m., so all last week, this class was Russian.

As soon as four o'clock came around, we were all Finnish.

Now, I did that for a reason, because now the rest of what I say will sound great compared to that joke.

We have a reputation here for lacking diversity, we are all liberal tree-hugging save-the-worlders. In some ways this is true, but I would argue that we represent just as much, if not more, diversity than most colleges and universities, because our individualized education allows us all to pursue our personal interests, and be individual human beings, instead of being locked into the same degree program as thousands of others, with little freedom to explore our own initiatives.

As we can already see, all of the languages I used to say welcome are spoken by the students graduating today. This class represents the following countries:

Argentina
Canada
Uruguay
Zimbabwe
Nicaragua
Eswatini
India
Costa Rica
Israel
United States
China
United Kingdom
Estonia
Denmark
Bhutan

And even within all of those countries there is a lot of diversity, for instance within the students from the U.S., there are at least twenty states represented here. Which is pretty dramatic, growing up in Maine it seemed like there were two states in the U.S., Maine, and "Away.”

Aside from this statistical diversity, I would just invite you to take a deeper look at your program where you will find titles of internships and senior projects.

There is a student from New York that did their senior project in Yucatan.
A student from Canada that worked in Kenya.
One from Argentina that worked in Croatia.
One from Quebec that worked on the college's very own farm.
One that interned with an outdoor education program and then did animation for a senior project.
One that worked for an NGO dealing with hunger and then did a photographic perspective of Macedonia.

Several students have had various foci and decided to work together on their project to start an international school in the Middle East and North Africa.

Some students wrote papers, threw pottery (literally on the ground), some made a video, drew architectural plans, did scientific research, studied culture, science, art, history, food, botany, economics, teaching, children, music, illustration, charismatic megafauna all the way down to invisible genetics or tiny plants.

But seriously, more importantly is how we start our days.

In the morning, these students like to start off their day with everything from tortillas and beans, to home fries, to yogurt burst cheerios?, to bagels, and of course, coffee.

Just like having breakfast every morning, people are always going ask you what human ecology is.

For students of this institution, past and present, don't worry about trying to explain human ecology, if you live your life as you have learned to here, it will emanate from you actions. Also don't take for granted the people around you. You might not want to hang out with everyone, and you might clash heavily with someone, but that doesn't mean that they don't have an aspect of worth.

To those who are just becoming students of the college by attending this ceremony, don't ask for explanations of human ecology, definitions will simply not help you understand.

Experience it.
Experience it through your favorite graduate.
Experience it by spending more time here, or by viewing the senior projects in the gallery or library.

I have found it wise to use someone else's words if they say something better than you can. Although, if I do, I have learned at COA to give them credit, So thank you to Robert Fulghum, who says in his book, All I Really Need to Know I Learned in Kindergarten published by Ivy Books in 1989 in New York:

"When you go out in the world, watch out for traffic, hold hands and stick together.”