The World Can Wait | Commencement Address by Ron Liebowitz President of Brandeis University

The World Can Wait

Excerpted from the commencement address delivered by Ron Liebowitz, President of Brandeis University, and father of two Roxbury Latin students.

It would be tempting to join the legions of commencement speeches this year that have presented a variety of interpretations of the Jarvis Refectory maxim: “From those to whom much has been given, much will be expected.” Such a speech would have me sharing words of wisdom that explains why your generation faces the toughest challenges ever, and, because you are so talented, to then exhort you to be bold and go out and fix all that is wrong with the world—from climate change to racial injustice to antisemitism to poverty to emerging diseases to growing mental health challenges. This has become a common mantra this year, most likely because we old folks are out of good ideas or haven’t the energy to do anything more. But I won’t go down that path.

Don’t get me wrong: all of the aforementioned topics are important—even critical—and certainly need fixing. But as philosophy professor Dr. Kathleen Stock has recently argued, we should stop this unfair burden of making your generation responsible for the big fix. She notes:

“...in terms of large-scale influence on the political stage, in business, technology, the charity sector, the film industry, or wherever else your individual talents or interests may lie, statistically speaking you are highly unlikely to make any noticeable difference whatsoever to anything. The world is too large, the competition too great, attention spans too short, and issues too complex and multi-faceted.”

I may not agree fully with Professor Stock’s statement, as I believe there is a very good chance that some of you here today will indeed succeed in solving some of the world’s most enduring problems. I have, after all, read your class’s Yearbook carefully enough to learn that one of you here today is pegged to find the cure for cancer by the age of 25. I would not bet against it. Or him.

But even so, I believe Professor Stock is right enough in her commentary to steer me away from lecturing you on anything that challenges your generation to be our saviors… Instead, having watched first-year students arrive at college for the past 38 years, I advise you—in fact, urge you—to dedicate the next four years to personal growth. (More on this in a moment.) For now, my point is that the world’s great problems can wait, despite what we Boomers and Gen X’ers say, until

The World Can Wait

you have done the hard and hopefully satisfying work that it will take to be in the position to make a difference. To be successful, you will first need to be deliberate, thoughtful, and even brave in how you navigate your way through college.

I should note that my message to you today is based on many years of teaching, mentoring, and advising students as a faculty member, and then serving as dean, provost, and president of two very different institutions. I hope my long and broad perspective will provide useful advice, even if some of what I have to say is not all sweetness and light.

As a parent of two RL’ers, and observing how the school “works” from where I sit, I can tell you with confidence that you are better prepared to succeed in college than you perhaps realize. I share this perspective not only because of the obvious strengths of your Roxbury Latin education—that is, the academics—but because of something else.

I believe a most important feature of your RL experience, which might be taken for granted by those less familiar with secondary and higher education, is the school’s system of advising. Its architecture and rules of engagement create an environment in which one learns and grows in ways that prepare you well for college and beyond. It is rare to find the one-on-one, highly personalized and engaged advising that you have all received here. The pledge that rolls off the tongue of Mr. Brennan so naturally—that “every boy is known and loved at RL”—begins with the advising system and ends here today at graduation, with young men ready and well prepared to take on the opportunities and challenges beyond this campus.

Through the RL advising system, you have learned to advocate for yourselves while parents are kept at armslength. And while this very intentional advising system may have at times been frustrating for you as students and maybe for your parents, too, it has taught you far more than how to approach and solve any particular problem. Consciously or unconsciously, as you deepened your relationship with your advisor, you took on a greater role in charting your future path.

This process, over several years, was excellent training for figuring out what you need from your education to mature and pursue your goals with clarity and direction. You are now ready to move from the basics of self-advocacy to something more deeply tied to character, which I know is so central to your education here at RL; it connects the selfknowledge that comes from advocating for yourself to the hard work that lies ahead.

In other words, learning to advocate effectively for oneself leads to self-knowledge. This self-knowledge, in turn, clarifies the work you need to do to make the most of your talents and strengths. The RL advising system brings every student through these stages, and elevates the likelihood for success in college and beyond.

Though you should all go off to your respective campuses with a good dose of confidence, you should avoid doing so in cavalier fashion, believing that everything will be easy sledding. For no matter how excellent one’s education has been, there are some challenges you will face in college for which no high school can prepare you. And that brings us to the less sweet side of my message today.

College campuses are, and have been for a long time, the most ideal places for young adults to pursue their academic passions and feed their curiosities. It is a place where one can expand his or her worldview by hearing from brilliant and inspiring faculty, and engaging in rigorous discussion in the classroom, the dining halls, residence halls, and the playing fields. Hopefully, you will find this to be your experience. It is important to understand, however, that a campus—any college campus—is a microcosm of our larger society, and as that society has become deeply polarized, so, too, have our colleges and universities.

And so, while I am a great and unequivocal advocate for higher education, I would be doing you a disservice if I did not provide some advice on how you might prepare for a learning and social environment that, like the country at-large, has become highly politicized and less welcoming than a mere generation ago.

It is hard to believe that it was less than four years ago, in late 2018, when Robbie George, Professor of Jurisprudence and Director of the James Madison Program in American Ideals and Institutions at Princeton University, and Cornel West, then Professor of Public Philosophy in the Divinity School and the Department of African and African-American Studies at Harvard, came to Brandeis to debate the question: What happened to civil, public discourse in America? Their visit was part of a nationwide tour meant to model how to engage with those whose opinions differ greatly from one’s own.

If you are unfamiliar with this duo, Professors George and West hold widely, and I mean widely, divergent political views. Yet their shared objective since 2017 has been to make clear on college campuses that democracy is threatened when individuals retreat into their own “echo chambers” and are no longer able or willing to engage those with different perspectives in civil discourse.

The impetus for their collaboration was an incident at a liberal arts college where a speaker was prevented from discussing his latest book because of previous research that was problematic and considered too controversial. Less than a month after the incident, which included a violent demonstration that sent the speaker’s host to the hospital, George and West issued a joint statement, calling for unfettered and free debate, even, and especially, when the topics are highly controversial and potentially offensive. More than 2,000 academics signed onto the statement.

The Robbie George-Cornel West debate at Brandeis was all it was intended to be… but the reactions to the evening by our students were and remain instructive; they provide a good snapshot of the current political climate on college campuses.

The most common reaction by students, raised in a number of classes the next day, was that West’s and George’s backand-forths were boring. Though the two academics held very different positions, and were erudite and articulate, their exchanges were viewed as “too friendly to be persuasive” and lacking any real significance. In these students’ opinion, the calm demeanor of the conversation diminished the quality of their arguments, and a good number of students said they tuned out midway through the event.

“Try—at least for the next four years—to ignore or deflect the pressure we older folks seem to be putting on your generation to fix so many things wrong with the world. Instead, at least for now, focus on all you need to learn and experience in order to make the most of your formidable potential in a way that ultimately will make a positive difference in the world.”

A second reaction, voiced independently in one-onone meetings during my office hours, was that a student could never take the conservative and religiously-aware viewpoints expressed by Robbie George in any debate on campus without some unpleasant consequences. Students argued that Robbie George was a tenured professor at Princeton, so it didn’t matter that he bucked the campus zeitgeist: he was secure in his job, but they, the students, had to face their classmates, friends, and professors every day. It would be impossible, they believed, to express such a view and retain relationships and maybe even good grades. Self-censorship, they argued, was their only and therefore chosen path—keeping their heads down and saving their opinions for the safety of their own echo chamber—even if it was, in their view, a very small one. That was four years ago. The environment on most campuses has gotten even more polarized. Freedom of speech, the very foundation of higher education’s noble mission to pursue truth wherever it might lead, has become so politicized by both the right and left that self-censorship has severely limited rigorous debate; this has cast a long shadow on higher education’s mission. Truth now has multiple meanings. Bullying and rude exchanges enter into too many conversations. And visiting lectures, once an important complement to in-class learning, have become difficult to host if the content presented does not adhere to a particular ideology. All of this has made the learning environment far less open and more challenging for students who seek the lofty goals of a liberal arts education.

And so: What might you do to find that ideal place where you can pursue your intellectual passions and growth amid the current campus environment? To challenge and perhaps even change your long-held beliefs...or deepen them...? How do you put yourself in the best position to experience a most inspiring and consequential four years?

Here is a list of things to consider, some very practical, others that will require you to exercise leadership, which might at times create some discomfort.

First, choose your courses wisely. Find older students who are familiar with the very best professors and the subjects that are of interest to you. Get their opinions. Chances are,

they know more about the curriculum, the faculty, and the classroom environment than your assigned adviser.

Second, review the syllabi for the courses you are considering. Does the reading list appear to present a range of perspectives, allowing you to develop a strong foundation for the subject matter and to form your own opinions?

Third: “Find your people,” as they say, and once you have developed trusting friendships, encourage the group to join you in consciously engaging students who are different from you—those whose deepest held values are not like yours and are sure to offer new perspectives on any number of issues. And, rely on these trusting friendships to join you in resisting the kind of groupthink that appears void of facts or simply doesn’t make sense.

Fourth: When you do branch out and engage differences, express your views without anger, bitterness, or disdain. Try to understand why others might hold opinions that you find wrong and even hateful. This will be difficult. But what is the alternative? To remain silent and resort to self-censorship will leave you with a greatly diminished education, forfeiting all you would learn from engaging others with different life experiences and points of view. It is the unique opportunity for personal and intellectual growth as a young adult among a sea of talented peers that is at stake here.

And, finally: Try—at least for the next four years—to ignore or deflect the pressure we older folks seem to be putting on your generation to fix so many things wrong with the world. Instead, at least for now, focus on all you need to learn and experience in order to make the most of your formidable potential in a way that ultimately will make a positive difference in the world.

Class of 2022, you have been blessed with an extraordinary education here at Roxbury Latin. I know you will do great things when you are ready to do them. Right now, our generation needs to look to you not to solve all of our problems, but to see how self-confident, broad-minded, and well-educated young adults will build strong and caring communities in the future. Congratulations, and good luck. //