College Street
19 Things We Love About Commencement
• Youngman Field at 4 a.m., dress code ranging from coats and ties to flannel pajamas
• The pre-dawn diligence of a legion of facilities professionals
• The pre-dawn student serenade of the president at 3 South Street and subsequent breakfast at Steve’s Park Diner
• The president picking up the tab at Steve’s
• A two-hour period that can start out cold and rainy and can conclude warm and sunny
• Phil Cyr’s behind-the-scenes stage management
• The colorful array of flags, representing the countries of the international graduates, flying from the top of Voter Hall
• The custom of academic regalia dating back to the 12th century
• Hoods on faculty gowns, specifically their distinctive colors that signify the faculty member’s graduate institution
• The student speaker. “Not that it isn’t great to get advice from cool people who have accomplished a lot in their lives,” says a recent grad, “but what was more meaningful to me was hearing what Midd meant to someone from our class . . . who knows the nuances of our lives at the College.”
• Six hundred replicas of Gamaliel Painter’s cane and the convoluted exchange that goes into receiving said cane and diploma
• Gamaliel Painter’s actual cane, carried in the procession by the president
• The Alice in Wonderland-type hats donned by the faculty marshals
• The shouts from families when their graduate walks across the stage (almost as if they weren’t sure this would actually happen)
• Faculty or staff or trustee-parents presenting the diploma to sons or daughters
• The wonderfully rich tenor of François Clemmons
• Rap, rap, rap, and tap, tap, tap
• Professors lining Storrs Walk and applauding the graduates as they exit
• Mead Chapel’s carillon drifting over a nearly empty campus in the early afternoon
