October 9, 2025

Thank you, Alisa and good afternoon, everyone!  It’s wonderful to see you all here.

I want to say a special hello to a few student leaders with us today representing some of our most active campus organizations.  They’re members of Vice Chancellor Lori Reesor’s student cabinet.  Thank you for being here!

And thanks to all of you.  In a year of significant change and challenge, your leadership and trusted advice have been essential — let’s give you a round of applause — thank you!

Welcome new leaders

Following tradition, I want to introduce new campus leaders (and “old” leaders in new roles):

John Zumbrunnen is our interim provost, succeeding Charles Isbell. John has been a senior vice provost overseeing teaching and learning, and he was one central architect of the RISE program that’s expanding our faculty in some exciting new directions. We’re launching a national search for a permanent replacement in fall.

We also have two new deans: Nita Ahuja, dean of the School of Medicine & Public Health and vice chancellor for medical affairs, succeeding Bob Golden, and Devesh Ranjan, dean of the College of Engineering, succeeding Ian Robertson.

I’ll ask these new leaders and our other vice chancellors, deans and directors to please stand or give a wave so we may recognize you for your service.  Thank you!

We’ve brought in four new deans and two new vice chancellors in the past year-and-a-half. If you could see the incredible leaders and scholars who want to be here, you would be reminded — as I am — of the power of our national reputation as a place that’s making a real difference in the world.  In every one of these searches, our top candidate has joined us here.

How we continue to do that in a moment of great disruption is what I want to address today.  But let me begin with a story.

A university familiar with challenge

Two weeks ago, right here in this room, I had the privilege of hosting a conversation with Chancellor Emerita Donna Shalala, who at 84 is just as engaged and energetic as she’s been throughout her storied career.

To prepare for the conversation, I took a look through some of her papers and found a speech she gave this very same week in October, 1991.  She said:

This has been a trying year for American higher education. Issues of political correctness … indirect cost rates … and budget constraints have threatened our future [and] the very nature and certainly the respect American higher education has enjoyed since its beginnings. 

[And] recent changes in the political climate and public attitudes toward higher education bring us to a critical juncture in [the university’s] history.

Thirty-four years ago.  Typewritten on onionskin before social media, before AI, and before many of the emerging issues that eat up so much of our time today.

I share this because I sometimes hear from people who envision a past that was free from serious challenge and hardship — but the reality is, that past never fully existed.

The story of this university is, and always has been, one of overcoming immense odds.

In fact, after the lofty pronouncements at our creation 177 years ago, we went into such deep debt to build our first buildings that university leaders had to sell off chunks of the campus for pennies on the dollar — and later buy them back for a princely sum (I see our real estate folks cringing). And in a true sign of desperation, they even borrowed money from the faculty to stay afloat!

We did not collapse under the weight of that moment, and we are not going to collapse under the weight of this one.  We will meet the challenges before us with the same creativity, determination, and excellence that have allowed us to build one of the greatest institutions of higher learning in the world!

Today’s challenges are on a different scale than they were 177 years ago, or even 34 years ago, but we know their general shape.

We know how to seize the opportunities that disruption can sweep onto our shores — opportunities to unlock fresh ideas and push ourselves to new levels of excellence.

While there may be bumps and bruises, we can and will manage the threats that disruption can bring.

Certainly this year we’re experiencing both the exhilarating upside of disruption, and the dispiriting downside.

Disruption’s upside

On the upside, the pace of innovation is absolutely staggering, and this university is leading the way — in artificial intelligence … quantum computing … renewable energies … and life-saving medical advances (including one I’ll tell you about in just a few minutes).  Not to mention our top-ranked programs in a vast range of disciplines — from engineering to dance, from law to printmaking to education — that are deeply engaged in exploring the many ways AI might be deployed.

AI is one of the most fundamentally disruptive changes any of us will experience in our lifetimes.  AI will have some impact on nearly everything we do — from how we treat and prevent illness to how we grow crops.

It is capable of both solving vexing problems and creating them — for example, it can spread disinformation far and wide in ways that may aggravate the divisions between us and subvert our democracy.

Here at UW–Madison, our spectacular new Morgridge Hall will be the nerve center that brings in a stunning range of specialties from all over campus — from engineers to philosophers — to work together in new ways as we ride through this ‘wild west’ moment.

If you haven’t been there, I hope you’ll go.  Our new facilities don’t have to be gobsmacking … but this one is!

It’s the largest and most sustainable building on this campus, built on time, under budget, and entirely through the generosity of alumni and friends, including many of you here today — let’s give you a round of applause!

One of the most visible impacts of AI is on the workforce. It’s potentially gobbling up some of the jobs that our graduates were landing just a few years ago — the media call it the ‘job-pocalypse.’

So we will need to be intentional and creative in thinking how best to prepare our students for the careers of the future.

Because in every challenge there is also opportunity.

Fueling entrepreneurship

One place you’ll see that is in our changing approach to entrepreneurship — we’re building a novel campuswide strategy for recruiting, developing, and launching entrepreneurs who so naturally drive, and thrive on, disruptive change (and help our society to fully integrate the benefits of that change).

Here’s just one small example of an entrepreneur harnessing AI to solve a problem many of us have experienced — long lines at coffee shops.  Adrian Deasy is one of our mechanical engineering graduates.

He created one of the first fully robotic coffee shops in the nation — right here in Wisconsin!  It’s called Octane Coffee. You order on your phone, and scan through to pay and pick up your drink.

You can visit them in Brookfield (and if we’re lucky, here in Madison one day soon).

I want to see us become a premier university for entrepreneurship — and we’re sailing in that direction with a new Entrepreneurship Hub to be led by our first-ever associate vice chancellor for entrepreneurship.  We’re conducting a national search for the right person as we speak.

This will help us row in the same direction across the university.

So we’re engaging fresh ideas for transformative teaching and research, and our faculty are finding exciting new pathways to take their work to new levels of excellence.

The amazing number of awards the faculty have won this year is one sign of that impact.

I am delighted to share with you our latest news that was announced just yesterday: Two of our brilliant faculty members have just been named MacArthur “Genius Grant” Award winners!

We are the only university in the country to have two current faculty members among the winners this year.

Over the years, UW–Madison has been exceptionally successful with this award: It is rare to have even one winner on any university campus, and this year’s winners bring us to five in just the last six years!

They are:

• Ángel Adames Corraliza in our Department of Atmospheric and Oceanic Sciences. Dr. Adames Corraliza’s work to understand the dynamics of tropical weather patterns is setting the stage for vastly improved weather forecasting that can save lives and help communities better prepare for extreme weather.
• And Sébastien Philippe in our Department of Nuclear Engineering and Engineering Physics. We brought Dr. Philippe to UW–Madison just this year. He’s an expert on nuclear security who works in collaboration with communities and policymakers to better understand the risks associated with building, testing, and storing launch-ready nuclear weapons.

This is an incredible testament to the excellence of our faculty — let’s have a round of applause for the winners!

Disruption’s downside

At the same time we celebrate our truly outstanding faculty and the opportunities disruption can bring us, we also are dealing with the uncertainty and instability that go along with rapid change.

In his bestselling book, A Walk in the Woods, the author Bill Bryson observes of hiking the Appalachian Trail:

The hardest part was coming to terms with the constant dispiriting discovery that there is always more hill.

In this moment, it can sometimes feel as if there is another hill beyond every horizon.

Whether we wish for it or not, we have the enormous challenge and the tremendous opportunity to help guide a reset in the compact that’s existed between higher education and the federal government for 80 years.

A compact that’s allowed this nation to become the world’s leader in innovation and discovery.

The federal cuts to research have already had a real and meaningful effect here. We’ve shuttered research projects … endured some layoffs … and imposed budget cuts to redirect money towards essential programs that are at risk.

I am happy to tell you that because of our fiscal restraint, we are in a fairly solid place financially. But there is more danger ahead with potential federal cuts that could have a devastating impact on our medical research on so many areas, from theranostics to Alzheimer’s, for example — and it could impact basic research, clinical trials, and so much more, as well as having ripple effects across our campus.

We’ve joined nearly two dozen other states to challenge these cuts in court — and for now, a permanent injunction is in place.  But there are no guarantees as these cases work their way through the appellate courts.  These are risks and I can’t minimize them.

And let me be clear: There are legitimate concerns about higher education that we ought to listen to and take seriously.

For example, I do think that we can be more transparent and accountable around:

• The return-on-investment for the degrees we confer, so that students can make informed decisions about the majors they pursue and the debt they incur. I’m proud that nearly 2/3 of our undergraduates leave us with zero student debt, but there is still more we can do to support both transparency and access at both the undergraduate and graduate level.
• And there are also, I think, legitimate potential reforms in relation to how we spend federal research dollars. We have joined with national organizations to advocate for a new approach to indirect costs (the overhead costs of conducting federal research that help us build labs and pay for the regulatory infrastructure we must operate within) that would add greater transparency and clarity.

There are also, in my view, some fair critiques about viewpoint diversity on university campuses. We all know that higher ed can be in our own bubble.  Here at UW–Madison, we know from polling (as is true at other universities) that some of our students who identify as conservative hesitate to speak in class not for fear of their professors, but for fear of what their peers might think.

If we don’t more actively demonstrate engagement with a broader set of viewpoints, I don’t think we’re doing our best for students or for our important commitment to preparing our graduates to be informed, active participants in a complex and diverse democracy where they’re going to engage with people who are different from themselves in every way.

So there are places where we can, and must, improve. But let me also be clear:

I will not hesitate to defend the precious institutional values that define this university’s excellence — including academic freedom, freedom of speech, and non-discrimination.

And let me add my strong support for our international students who have been part of this university since our very first class in 1849 (yes — in 1849 we had a student from Canada!).

Our international enrollment this semester is down by about 500 students — that’s a somewhat smaller reduction than what many universities are seeing — but we don’t want a single one of our admitted students to lose the opportunity to come here.

They enrich our campus culturally and academically and bring critically important perspectives that advance our research and enliven the exchange of ideas.

Polarization

Which brings me to our work to address polarization.

We must double down on helping our students learn to disagree productively and engage respectfully with one another across their differences.

Not because we think that engaging across their differences will help them reach some magical consensus or total agreement — we don’t want to be a monoculture — but because we want our campuses to be places where people are challenged in ways that sometimes change their minds and sometimes sharpen and clarify the views that they already had.

I recently heard a story from 1967 — another time of great disruption.  An ROTC student named John Henz showed up to class in uniform, girding himself for hostility.  And was shocked when the protestors stepped aside and said:

“You are who we are trying to save.”

He later said: “That was the great experience for me of the University of Wisconsin–Madison. This ability to get clarity in your thoughts, to keep an open mind. This is what a university education is all about.”

This university in this purple state, and with a long tradition of passionate engagement with social and political issues, has an extraordinary opportunity to be a leader and a model for the nation for how to work across differences in ways that respect our shared humanity.

Here’s one program we started two years ago, and which some of you have heard me talk about.

It’s called Deliberation Dinners, and it brings together students from diverse viewpoints with trained faculty facilitators to share meals throughout the academic year and discuss deeply polarizing issues like gun rights and immigration.

The results have been remarkable. Here’s a quote from a student who participated last year:

I often view the “progressive left” as moral grandstanders not worthy of respect, but after having conversations with many of them I learned that they are people, like me, with good intentions and I hope they realize that in me, too.

We hear similar sentiments from students who come from all places on the political spectrum.

We’ve been able to triple the number of students in this program in just two years and still can’t accommodate all of the interest — and that’s one reason why I am going to announce publicly, in the next two weeks, some campuswide opportunities and new programs that will bring our work on civil dialogue to a whole new level.

I decided on the name just last week with input from a group our students — can’t say more just yet but watch for an announcement in the coming weeks!

There are those who believe that learning to engage peacefully and thoughtfully with people whose life experiences and viewpoints differ from our own is optional.

I disagree.  I say this work foundational to what we need for our students, our institutions, and our democracy, and I am excited that we’re going to do more in this space.

* * * *

Now shifting directions: For some of you, this may be the moment you were waiting for … it’s time for the quiz!

Please locate the pencils and paper on your tables.  Ready?

Quiz Answers

Here are the answers. Let’s see how you did:

Our alumni raised $26.2 billion in venture capital (raised by 943 alumni; source: Pitchbook)— making us the fifth-best public university in the nation for number of graduates founding companies backed by venture capital. We’re also the second-place all-time leader in alumni joining the Peace Corps — it’s a very “UW–Madison” thing to achieve excellence across incredibly diverse measures!

This is an online trend that’s swept campuses across the country and pokes gentle fun at men who change their hobbies or style in hopes of impressing women.  Contestants carry tote bags and lattes, play Fleetwood Mac songs on the guitar, and carry books by feminist authors.  This is the winner, freshman Posse scholar from Chicago Khabbab Gassikia.

Billy Joel has never played at Camp Randall, but he’s appeared on campus three times: at the Stock Pavilion in the late ’70s as his career was taking off, and twice sharing the Kohl Center stage with Elton John.

These animals all work for UWPD. Horses Rettke and Vetter (named after volleyball player Dana Rettke and women’s hockey player Jessie Vetter) work crowd control; Ritter and Mavi are trained in human tracking and explosive detection; and Dusty and Hoagie are therapy dogs.

Good job!  Let’s give you a round of applause!

Research breakthrough

You are clearly familiar with the amazing research happening here — but I do want to share one story about a recent major breakthrough in biomedical engineering that you likely haven’t heard about — one that shows how we can build urgently needed common ground for life-saving science.

This is a national consortium of scientists, industry leaders, ethicists, and advocates — developed and led in its inaugural years by Professor Kris Saha at the Wisconsin Institute for Discovery — which set out to answer one urgent question:

Can a new, personalized drug be developed quickly enough to save a life?

Kris and his consortium knew that a new CRISPR drug could correct genetic mutations with great precision, but they were always racing against the clock. (CRISPR is a technology that makes it possible to edit DNA; the logo you see is the NIH program that’s aiming to accelerate the transfer of these technologies out of the lab and into the world.)

They were told this would be a losing battle: Getting a new drug through the FDA could take decades.

They were told no pharmaceutical company would invest in producing a CRISPR drug for exceptionally rare diseases.

But as Kris put it: We decided that was outdated thinking.

So they worked together with the FDA to prove safety, and they worked with industry partners to establish manufacturing platforms for personalized therapies.

This year, Kris’s colleagues in Philadelphia — part of the larger consortium — used the platform to manufacture a personalized drug, and you see the result.

It took not three decades or even three years, but three months. Today, we have a new blueprint for bringing custom therapies to millions of people with rare diseases.

Even our somewhat controversial secretary of Health and Human Services, RFK Jr., heralded this result, reached out to the infant’s family, and then posted a national address about the importance of investing in cutting-edge cures for disease.

The next step will be manufacturing these therapies for rare vision disorders — in Kris’s program right here in Wisconsin, changing lives and creating new jobs along the way.

I want to thank Dr. Kris Saha, who is here today, for leading the larger national consortium and the program here on campus — will you please stand?  Thank you, Kris!

Conclusion

The determination — some might call it stubbornness — to do things we’re sometimes told can’t be done has been so naturally “UW” from our earliest days. It will serve us well as we navigate the choppy waters ahead.

Which brings me back to Donna Shalala and that 34-year-old speech. An awful lot of what she said is spot-on today.  But there’s one thing she didn’t get right.

She predicted that the university would grow its excellence. And we have certainly done that.  But she also predicted we would shrink the student population, which we haven’t.

In fact, this year’s freshman class is one of the largest in our history, selected from a record 74,000 applicants — a double-digit increase over last year!  And it includes the greatest number of first-generation students in our history.

But I understand why Chancellor Shalala couldn’t envision that we’d be able to grow in size as one of the greatest universities in the nation while simultaneously serving thousands more students, with drastically fewer state dollars.

Who could imagine that we would set new records for:

• Student retention, now at 96%, 12 points above the national average?
• Six-year graduation rate, closing in on 90%, which puts us in the top 10 public universities in the country?
• And time-to-degree — now at a record low of 3.86 years?

And who would dare to hope that we would be graduating more than 2/3 of our undergraduates with no student debt?

So I am optimistic. Not recklessly so — I am well aware of the enormity of the challenges before us.

But I deeply believe that, together, we can rise to those challenges.

I believe we can preserve and protect our values while moving beyond the structures and mindsets of the last century that may not be serving us as well.

And I believe that even in moments that feel incredibly unsettled, we can build our excellence in exciting new ways to meet our proud Wisconsin Idea mission.

Because I have seen this university do extraordinary things.

We won’t meet every challenge in a day, or even a year.  And we won’t do it alone.

But with your help, we can find pathways through.

And while we do that, let’s also remember to celebrate, and to see, and to continue to be awed by the incredible things happening at this institution, and that you are all a part of.

Thank you and On, Wisconsin!

September 2, 2025

Thank you, Provost Zumbrunnen, and hello, new Badgers!  I am delighted to welcome you to one of greatest universities in the world — the University of Wisconsin–Madison!

Students, you are a very accomplished group!  Among you are:

• National Merit Scholars and high school valedictorians
• Eagle Scouts
• Debate champions
• And winners of major national research competitions.

And so much more.  You’re:

• Standout athletes
• Talented musicians
• Community volunteers

And I’m just scratching the surface. Every one of you deserves to be here and belongs here.

Over the next weeks and months, you will get to know so many new people, so here’s my advice:

Go beyond a smile, a nod, or a “hey.”  Ask questions.  See if you can find the classmate who started a successful business in high school … or the classmate who organizes registration drives for organ donors … or the classmate who rehabilitates injured animals … or classmates who serve in the U.S. military.

All are here with you today.  So dig a little bit beneath the surface and find out something that matters.

New students by the numbers

Let me tell you a little more about yourselves:

• There are nearly 10,000 of you joining our university this year — and 1,200 transfer students (let’s hear from you!). We also have about 8,500 freshmen (freshmen, make some noise!).
• We selected each of you from a record 74,000 applicants. You can be really proud that you were admitted in one the most competitive years in our history.
• We’re still finalizing numbers, but it looks like this year’s freshman class (for the first time since I became chancellor) represents all 50 U.S. states, Puerto Rico, and Washington, D.C.!
• I want to hear from you if you’re from one of the biggest states outside of Wisconsin represented in this class:
  • #5 and #4 go together — the tri-state area — New Jersey & New York (and let’s not leave out Connecticut), where are you?
  • #3 — Minnesota — let’s hear it!
  • #2 — California — make some noise!
  • #1 — you know who you are — Illinois, where are you? Congrats!
• We also have international students from around 50 different nations all around the globe — students, let’s hear it for our international Badgers!
• OK, Wisconsin — are you ready? If you’re from the great state of Wisconsin, make some noise!
• Welcome, all!
• And here’s something I’m really proud of: This freshman class includes more students who are in the first generation in their family to go to college than we’ve ever seen.  If you are a member of the first generation of your family to attend college, please rise as you’re able — let’s hear it for them!

Pin & Selfie

Do you all have a pin that says “Badger 2025”?  This is a brand-new tradition, and it’s special for Convocation — being right here, right now, is the only way you can get one, so I’d like to ask you to take a moment to put it on and then I want a selfie with all of you.  Ready?  (takes selfie with students)

Your first official UW portrait!  I’ll post it on Instagram if you want to follow me there @UWChancellor.

Value and values

Tomorrow you will begin your first classes.  As you do that, I want you to keep one important thing in mind:

Your education is in your hands.

For most of you, graduation day is about four years away.  That’s 1,461 days.  That’s quite a few days, but it will also go by in a flash.  And what you do with those days will help chart a course for your life.

We’ll be here to help and support you, but it’s up to you to decide what you’ll do with this amazing opportunity.  The ways you choose get involved.  The deep friendships that you’ll make.  The academic risks you take, the challenges you rise to, and the acts of kindness that you choose.

The math is pretty simple: The more you invest in your learning, and in your overall experience here at UW–Madison, the more value your education will have.

Pluralism

We want you to ask bold questions. We want you think deeply about ideas. And we want you to feel empowered to both agree and disagree with one another, and with your professors and with me.

And when you have strong views, we want you to disagree with respect for our common humanity.  I would ask you to start out with curiosity and generosity rather than condemnation and judgment.

That’s true for the small stuff — like when you’re debating the relative importance of the engagement news about your favorite English teacher and your favorite gym teacher.

But it’s equally true for the bigger, harder conversations. There will likely even be days when the discussions you’ll have won’t feel super comfortable.  But by engaging with a great diversity of ideas, you will learn something about yourself, and you’ll emerge with a stronger, deeper sense of what drives you, and what you believe and why.

This is part of the process you heard the provost call “sifting and winnowing” — it’s how new insights and discoveries come to life.

One essential ingredient in this process is pluralism — that’s a word you’ll probably hear a lot this year.  It means we bring together people with many different backgrounds and points of view and identities (in other words, all of you) to discuss and debate ideas. You will learn from each other, from those similar to you and equally, you will learn from your differences.

Learning from one another will enrich you, and it will also connect you — to one another, and to the broader world.  It will ground you in our community, and it will also let you soar. When you step into the unknown, when you take a chance on a hard conversation with empathy and civility, when you open yourself up to others, and when you embrace the unexpected, you just might find that you discover a new intellectual passion or make a lifelong friend.

Outstanding faculty

And, in your time here, you will have an opportunity to work with some of the top scholars in the world.

Slide:  Prof. Oyola-Merced with students

People like Professor Mayra Oyola-Merced, who came to us from NASA’s Jet Propulsion Lab and who is a much-beloved mentor to our undergraduates.  She’s working on ways to improve how we predict severe weather — building on our long tradition of excellence as the birthplace of weather satellite technology.

Slide: Prof. Chevrette with headphones

People like Professor Marc Chevrette, who started here just this month with all of you.  The undergraduates in his lab listen in on the chemical conversations between bacteria to help search for new antibiotics in some really unlikely places like the microbiomes (i.e., guts) of frogs, snakes, insects, and even freshwater sponges.

Slide:  Bad Bunny & Prof. Melendez-Badillo

Or if you’re interested in history, you could take a class with Professor Jorell Meléndez-Badillo, a Latin American and Caribbean history scholar who collaborated with Bad Bunny on his latest album, “Debí Tirar Más Fotos” [translation: I should have taken more photos] to create a narrative to accompany songs that celebrate Puerto Rican history and culture.

These are just three of the more than 2,000 renowned scholars on our faculty.  All of them are eager to welcome you here!

Go Big Read

I got to talk to a few of your parents last week at move-in and several of them who were, themselves, students here back in … the late 1900s … said this place feels even bigger than it did then, and they’re right: We’ve grown!

You’ve heard about the ways we make the campus feel smaller and help you find your place here — but there’s one campuswide event that we make as big as possible. It’s a university-wide book club called Go Big Read.

This year it’ll bring all of us together to read and talk about an incredible new book called James: A Novel by Percival Everett that reimagines Mark Twain’s classic novel The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn from the perspective of Jim, who was the enslaved man who escaped and accompanied Huck down the Mississippi River on a raft.

It’s a bestseller and winner of this year’s Pulitzer Prize for fiction, and it invites us to think about how the assumptions people make about us (and our assumptions about others) affect our lives. And how there are many ways of seeing, and being in, the world. You’ll receive a free copy on your way out today.

Many of our professors will incorporate the book into their classes, and the author will come and visit us and spend a day on campus engaging in conversations and giving a talk.  I hope you’ll join us for that.

Conclusion

You are joining a university that produces Nobel laureates and Pulitzer prizewinners. Best-selling authors, star athletes, leaders of non-profits, and people who create meaningful and beautiful works of art, and so much more.

And this is also a place that’s pretty proud of its inspired goofiness.  We plant pink flamingoes all over Bascom Hill and Jump Around and put a giant Statue of Liberty head on ice-covered Lake Mendota in the middle of winter.

You, today, are joining this wonderful community, and we are all stronger for your presence here.

From this moment on, you share a common identity as Badgers that I hope you’ll proudly claim for the rest of your lives.

And so a very, very warm welcome to every one of you!  We are so happy that you are here.

Babcock & Bucky

To conclude our time together, we’re going to celebrate with one time-honored Badger tradition, and then invite you to join us for a second.  The first is (of course) singing Varsity together and the second is (of course) Babcock ice cream.

We can’t do both at once, it doesn’t work so well, so we’ll sing here and then eat ice cream — courtesy of the Wisconsin Alumni Association — right next to Memorial Union at Alumni Park.

So thank you all for being here. Now please join me in welcoming one very special Badger … and On, Wisconsin!

(Bucky enters)

I still remember my first day at college — the hush after my parents departed, getting to know my roommates, and that doubt that could sometimes creep in: Do I really belong here?

I’m riding around this week in one of those boxy white trucks we affectionately call “toaster cars,” popping into different residence halls to meet parents and families, helping haul an impressive amount of stuff upstairs (with great assistance from our upperclassmen), and assuring the new students who have come to UW–Madison from around the state, the nation, and the world that they absolutely do belong here.

I’m talking with new students from places near (all over Wisconsin, Minnesota, and Illinois) and not-so-near (California and New York) and quite far (one of our freshmen from Dubai was seeing our state for the very first time; we talked about how to survive and thrive through a long Wisconsin winter).

I see proud parents and families (some already in “Wisconsin Dad” and “Wisconsin Mom” T-shirts) smoothing fresh sheets onto beds, assembling furniture, and rushing out on last-minute errands that take on special meaning as they delay that inevitable (and oh-so-hard!) last good-bye.

I vividly remember the day I moved my daughter into her freshman dorm. We’d forgotten a few things, so I ran over to CVS to pick them up for her. It was a simple errand, mundane, but also freighted, as I marked the moment because who knew when I might have another chance to do this for her?

To get to watch our students learn about each other and our traditions and this beautiful campus, and to see them grow into thoughtful and accomplished leaders and scholars, is truly one of the great privileges of being chancellor.

Game Changer

As we gear up for fall, college athletics is facing a seismic shift that could transform scholarships, team structures, and department and university strategy.

We remain committed to supporting all 23 Badger sport programs. That means making some thoughtful changes — like expanding sponsorships (look for the Culver’s logo on center court at the Kohl Center) and bringing concerts back to Camp Randall Stadium — to help meet the financial realities ahead and ensure our Badger athletes continue to thrive, whether in competition or the classroom.

On, Wisconsin!

Jennifer L. Mnookin
Chancellor

* * * *

Chancellor’s Choice

Feeling nostalgic after reading about move-in? You’re in luck! The UW Archives has digitized every issue of the Badger yearbook back to 1884. It’s a rich, quirky chronicle of campus life through 2014 — the year publication of Badger yearbooks ceased. (Why? Read more here).

If you’re a foodie like me, you might enjoy Lab Culture Recipes — an online cookbook cocreated by UW genetics professor Ahna Skop PhD’00 pairing scientists’ favorite recipes with personal stories. It’s a delicious way to explore the diverse backgrounds that fuel scientific discovery.

And if you’re in search of a great fall read, pick up James by Percival Everett — a retelling of The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn that won the 2025 Pulitzer Prize for Fiction. It’s this year’s Go Big Read book, and I’m so excited that we’ll welcome the author to campus this fall.

The capitol-to-campus view wasn’t an accident. Wisconsin’s first governor, Nelson Dewey, and the state’s early leaders wanted a clear and close connection, and the first regents called UW–Madison “a blessing and an ornament to the state” — big words for a campus that at the time had more horses than students and one lonely building sitting atop a grand hill.

From the start, this university has been a partnership with the state, created to solve problems in ways that can fundamentally change lives. (More on that below!) But over the years, as many of you may be aware, funding for public universities in Wisconsin slipped to 44th in the nation.

A public university by — and for — Wisconsin

Thanks in meaningful part to so many of you who have made your voices heard, that’s starting to change. There are several things to cheer about in the state’s new budget, such as the legislature’s investment in renovating our historic Science Hall, but there are also concerning new requirements around faculty teaching loads that will weaken our ability to compete for top talent. I’ll be working with the regents and legislature to find a path forward that recognizes the vital contributions of our faculty and instructional staff in education, research, and outreach, and the critical importance of being able to hire and retain the very strongest and most talented scholars and teachers.

Regardless of state or federal pressures, our aims remain the same. We are still driving research, preparing educators, launching start-ups, and expanding opportunity because we believe deeply in our founding mission and the good this university does for the people of Wisconsin — and beyond.

Public science, personal impact

To share just one example: you might know that the UW Health Transplant Center is one of the premier centers of its kind in the world — but I’m guessing you might not have heard about the center’s most recent extraordinary innovation (now in clinical trials), which may allow some kidney transplant recipients to live without antirejection medications.

At the same time, the UW is doing fascinating work on xenotransplantation — genetically engineering pigs for organ donation (with three clinical trials now in development), helping to bring new hope to patients urgently awaiting life-saving transplants.

These discoveries matter deeply to me — both professionally and personally. In the depths of the pandemic, I donated a kidney to my father. Since I couldn’t be there in person, the UW Solution preserved it safely on a red-eye from LA to Boston.

We’re celebrating this lifesaving work in organ transplantation with a special project this month — I hope you’ll take a peek.

A final bit of good news

UW–Madison was just named a Princeton Review Best Value College for 2025, a Money magazine Best College, and number 14 in the country for Best Alumni Network — not to mention number 30 out of more than 21,000 universities in the latest world rankings, confirming what we’ve long known: we’re delivering an outstanding, life-changing, and affordable education. (Two-thirds of UW–Madison undergrads now graduate with no student loan debt.) We couldn’t do it without each of you!

On, Wisconsin!

Jennifer L. Mnookin
Chancellor

* * * *

Chancellor’s Choice

I often highlight successes, but Sean Jacobsohn ’94’s online Failure Museum — a collection of things that didn’t go as planned — offers valuable lessons in resilience, risk, and innovation.

Taylan Stulting PhDx’26 and two teammates rowed 2,800 grueling miles from California to Hawaii, setting a new world record in the World’s Toughest Row.

The Wisconsin Idea just went intergalactic! UW–Madison physicists helped bring a new observatory in Chile to life, and that observatory has the world’s largest digital camera. Travel to places several thousand light years away from Earth on a Skyviewer tour or browse the stars on your own.

Our remarkable new alumni have stepped off campus and into the world, carrying the Wisconsin Idea with them — from Wisconsin towns like Berlin, Florence, and Stockholm, to their namesakes abroad and everywhere in between.

They’re leaving with an abundance of memories and experiences, with new knowledge gained and lasting friendships formed. But like Badgers before them, as they go, they leave things behind, too: ideas … projects … traditions. A campus shaped in so many ways by their time here.

Most who have spent a summer in Madison probably remember “Hippie Christmas,” that stretch of late summer when leases turn over and treasure hunters scour curbs for secondhand finds. (It even made the New York Times this month!) Our Sustainable Move-Out program builds on that same spirit with a little more structure and purpose. Last year, we kept 80 tons of usable items out of the landfill when students left the dorms.

It’s just one small piece of a larger effort to tackle challenges like sustainability across campus.

Good Chemistry

Here’s one more piece: biochemist Brian Fox and his team have engineered poplar trees that produce a high-demand chemical — used in everything from preservatives to sports performance materials to the production of pharmaceuticals — right inside the tree. Seriously: these trees have been engineered to produce a nearly pure version of a much-needed chemical. No fossil fuels. No harm to the tree. Just a breakthrough made possible by years of foundational research and sustained public investment.

This project is just one of many amazing examples of the far-reaching impact of innovation and discovery taking place at UW–Madison.

A Closing Note

Given the substantial proposed changes in federal funding and resulting risk and uncertainty, we are taking necessary steps to help protect our long-term financial viability. We will be implementing budget reductions of 5 to 7 percent in certain core funding areas for fiscal year 2026, as well as additional steps in central administration to improve efficiency and redirect savings toward mission-centric activities. Like our peers, we are not insulated from the impacts brought on by the upheaval in higher education. But even in these complex and uncertain times, the UW–Madison community comes together to pursue the extraordinary and advance the Wisconsin Idea.

To our alumni, thank you for what you have left behind — the research you contributed to, the traditions you started, the fresh ideas that moved us in a new direction. The journeys you began here and the ties to campus you’ve maintained are such an important part of what makes UW–Madison the world-class university it is today.

Wishing you all a summer full of connection, reflection, and Terrace-yellow sunshine.

On, Wisconsin!

Jennifer L. Mnookin
Chancellor

* * * *

Chancellor’s Choice

Perhaps inspired by an incredible NFL Draft performance, prospective UW Marching Band members are on campus this summer, hoping to master the iconic “stop at the top” step and prepare for those legendary auditions (fond memories, band alumni?) in order to join the ranks of one of the best college marching bands in the country.

At the same time, in a workshop tucked away in the Humanities Building, one expert technician and two student helpers are bringing 270 hardworking band instruments back to life — a summertime tradition to make sure we’re ready for Fifth Quarters come fall.

And speaking of bands, we’re bringing concerts back to Camp Randall this summer! It’s been nearly 30 years since U2 and the Rolling Stones were here, and this summer we’re welcoming Morgan Wallen in June and Coldplay in July!

When I last wrote to all of you, I shared some of the challenges the university is facing, and I want to thank so many of you who have asked how you can help. Those challenges are still alive and very much with us, but on this warm spring day, with our beautiful campus gardens in full bloom, I want to share just a few of the wonderful things that are happening here.

Some of you were with us in Madison just weeks ago for a truly magical commencement weekend (the largest commencement in our history, with more than 10,000 graduates taking part). We had picture-perfect weather, and tens of thousands of joyful family and friends gathered to watch us confer UW–Madison degrees in ceremonies at the Kohl Center and Camp Randall Stadium.

On commencement eve, I put together my own list of a dozen of the great many wonderful things about this past year. I thought I’d share them with you here, in no particular order:

1. Taking a selfie with around 7,000 new students at convocation in September.
2. Going (back) to LA for the Badgers’ first-ever Big Ten football game against USC — the loss was disappointing, but the pregame tailgate (1,000 strong) was pretty awesome.
3. Touring a nearly complete Morgridge Hall, our fantastic new home for the School of Computer, Data & Information Sciences, set to open for the fall semester.
4. Seeing the aurora borealis for the first time, with my husband, in the backyard of Olin House.
5. Celebrating 100 years of the University of Wisconsin Hillel Foundation — mazel tov to Greg and Andrea Steinberger for their 25 years of leadership. (I think this makes them the longest-serving couple in Hillel history anywhere!)
6. Attending winter commencement, where keynote speaker and Top Chef finalist Dan Jacobs shared advice and spatchcocked a chicken on stage.
7. Visiting a great many counties across the state and learning what a hodag is in Rhinelander, wading into cranberry bogs, touching the ice-cold water of Lake Superior, and sampling cheese. (So. Much. Cheese.) Not to mention meeting with outstanding industry and agricultural partners along the way.
8. Witnessing our amazing programs to promote civil discourse and discussion across difference, like our Deliberation Dinners, The Discussion Project, BridgeMadison, the Main Street Project, and Bridging the Divide.
9. Seeing the building blocks for the next generation of IceCube — the first neutrino detector of its kind — led by UW–Madison scientists, set to be installed at the South Pole, and a potential key to understanding the creation of our universe. (Really!)
10. Breaking ground on the new Phillip A. Levy Engineering Center for our top-ranked College of Engineering.
11. Seeing so many tremendous UW–Madison faculty recognized for their excellence, including four new members elected to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences.
12. Cheering for Badger women’s hockey and getting to join this amazing team on the ice after they won their eighth — yes, eighth — national title. They are officially the winningest women’s hockey team in NCAA Division I history!

What a privilege it is to lead this incredible university. Until next time, I hope this season brings you all of the hope and joy that the blossoms of late spring can inspire.

On, Wisconsin!

Jennifer L. Mnookin
Chancellor

* * * *

Chancellor’s Choice

• Check out our new 360-degree virtual campus tour. See old familiar spots and places that are new (or just new to you) and give the prospective future Badgers in your life a look at the campus that could someday be their alma mater, too.
• Now that it’s spring, I’m excited to hit the trails at my favorite hiking spots. Did you know that more than 255 species of birds have been spotted in the Lakeshore Nature Preserve over the past 25 years? If you’re in Madison or nearby, learn about the preserve’s birds, animals, insects, and human history on a field trip, or take part in Bioblitz.
• Finally, a special note of gratitude to the record 400 alumni and current students who came out in person to advocate for research funding and financial aid (among other things) at UW–Madison Day at the Capitol and UW–Madison Day in DC. Telling your stories about the university’s impact can make a real difference. Thank you! Visit our new research impact website to learn more about how UW–Madison’s federally funded research changes the world.

May 10, 2025

Good afternoon, everyone! I am so happy to welcome you to the 172nd spring commencement of the University of Wisconsin–Madison.

For family and friends who have never been inside our historic Camp Randall Stadium: This is the only place in the country where football has five quarters and everyone gets to jump around.

Parents, family, and friends, please join me in recognizing the amazing Class of 2025.

Graduates, you walked through those gates as students. In just an hour or so you’ll walk through them again as alumni — part of our big, worldwide Badger family, nearly half a million strong!

To earn a degree from one of the greatest universities in the world is an enormous accomplishment, and you haven’t done it alone. Let’s have a big Badger “thank you” for the family and friends who have helped you reach this day. Please make some noise!

For a number of you, there are also friends, colleagues, and family members you are missing today, whose love and support helped bring you to this place. We remember them as well.

Class of 2025

As you have learned in your time here, we don’t do things in a small way at UW–Madison. 8,679 of you are graduating today — making this year’s commencement the largest in our 176-year history!

• 186 of you will be awarded law degrees today. Where are our Law School graduates? Congratulations!
• 1,511 of you are master’s degree candidates. Make some noise! Congratulations!
• Bachelor’s candidates … are you ready? Today we confer bachelor’s degrees on 6,982 of you. Let’s hear it! Congratulations!

And let’s give an especially warm welcome to a person who has figured out how to make a living doing what many of you do for free: explaining why Badger athletes, and Badgers in general, are the best in the Big Ten.

Wall Street Journal columnist and member of the Class of 1992: Jason Gay, thank you for giving today’s keynote address and welcome home to Madison!

I suspect Jason may have something to say about our Badger women’s hockey team, which has won not one … not two … not five … but a record-breaking eight national championships, so I will say only this: To the graduating seniors who are members of that storied team, thank you for giving us all a whole lot to cheer about!

Members of this class also have had lots of the kind of wins that don’t come with a trophy. I want to recognize two groups in particular:

If you are part of the first generation in your family to earn a college degree, please stand as you’re able and make some noise!

If you are a veteran of the United States armed services, or serving on active duty or in the Reserves — whether you’re down here or up in the stands — please stand as you’re able so we may thank you for your service!

Now there’s one more group I want to recognize. We are very proud to be a public university. That means that if you are a Wisconsinite, you have helped contribute to our state having one of the world’s greatest universities. If you are a taxpayer here in our great state of Wisconsin, will you stand as you’re able, so we can recognize and appreciate that you have helped to build this wonderful university? Thank you!

Now, Class of 2025, I want you to think all the way back to your arrival at college. Remember stepping off that plane, or watching your family drive away, and feeling that mixture of excitement and anxiety, wondering if you’d ever feel at home here? You came from all over Wisconsin, across the U.S., and all around the world, with a huge range of backgrounds, beliefs, and life experiences. And this place is big. On those first days, it was exciting, but also daunting.

But pretty quickly, you started to find your place here. Doing a class project or on a team or at the Union or out with the Hoofers or at the Red Gym or in one of our thousand student organizations, or maybe over an Ian’s Pizza late at night with your roommates. One way or another, you found your people and your places, and pretty soon you did feel at home!

Which isn’t to say you found people who always agreed with you.

Connection, not agreement

In fact, an essential part of your UW–Madison education has been learning to find ways to connect, not disconnect … and to engage, not disengage — and to do that even when you disagreed. To move beyond bubbles and echo chambers.

And that’s important. Because you are stepping into a world that is both deeply complex and distressingly polarized, and you have the power to do something good in that world. Especially if you can find ways to work with people you might not always agree with.

Some of you might know the story of Fred Guttenberg, whose daughter, Jamie, was killed at Parkland High School, and former Congressman Joe Walsh, a Republican from Illinois who is a strong gun rights advocate.

The two spent years sparring on social media, but that changed when the Congressman posted a message that said, in essence:

I disagree with Mr. Guttenberg, but I respect him.

That led to a phone call, which led to dinner, and, eventually, a friendship. And then, the two of them spent months touring the country, including college campuses, as Two Dads Defending Democracy, to model civil conversations on difficult topics, something they believe is critical for our democracy.

And I am inspired by how many of you believe that too.

I have seen the way that so many in this class have been deeply involved in similar work: reaching across your differences to have civil conversations about difficult topics. This happened in a great many of your classrooms, in your research projects, in your experiential learning, as well as in so many other spaces.

• Some of you were part of our very first Deliberation Dinners, where you discussed controversial topics with classmates whose ideas and perspectives were very different from your own.
• Some of you jumped on board with a new student organization called BridgeMadison, where you got to practice listening, debating, and compromising.
• And still others of you were part of the Bridging the Divide initiative, whose slogan is “Replacing snark with conversation, tweets with talk, and scrolls and likes with face-to-face dialogue.”

Zack Dulian spent this year helping to lead that initiative at the Tommy G. Thompson Center on Public Leadership. Zack said, “I decided to be the change I want to see.”

Zack — where are you?  Thank you!

Members of this class have been dedicated to forging connections in so many different ways.

Shiann Her brought her unique perspective as a Hmong woman to her work as president of the Financial Occupations Club for University Students. She became a role model for women and people of color, who have traditionally been significantly underrepresented in the world of finance.

And today, she’s proud to serve as the flag bearer for the School of Human Ecology!

Shiann, where are you? Thank you!

And Micky Singh brought different perspectives and life experiences to the Law School as a member of the Wisconsin Army Reserves and son of Punjabi Sikh immigrants. Micky was usually the only member of the military in his classes, and his classmates got to know him as someone who would raise questions and share ideas few others had considered, greatly enriching their discussions.

Micky, where are you? Thank you and congratulations!

Conclusion

Graduates, as you head off into your next chapter, it may feel far easier and more comfortable to retreat into your bubble, especially given the polarization — and sometimes vitriol — so often present around you.  I urge you to resist that.

Whatever issue you care about, whatever your perspective, speak up. Fight fiercely for what you believe in! But don’t shut people out who may see the world differently — instead, embrace the pluralism around you, and see what happens when you welcome others in with curiosity before judgment.

Part of what I hope you’ve learned here is that you can work together to do something meaningful in the world even when you disagree. Put differently, you don’t have to agree on everything in order to get something important done together.

Because we will not reach a place where we can make things better without a genuine effort to recognize our shared humanity. That is the best, and indeed the only, way to build lasting change.

And you, graduates, you are our future. Class of 2025, you have shown us that you are brilliant. You have shown us that you care about the world. You have shown us that you are resilient and resourceful. You have shown us that you care about each other. So now, I am thrilled to see you take all of those experiences with you, as you go forth as proud Badgers!

Class of 2025: We are so very proud of you. Congratulations, and On, Wisconsin!

May 9, 2025

Thank you, Provost Isbell and good evening, everyone. Welcome to the 172nd spring commencement of the University of Wisconsin–Madison!

Congratulations, graduates!

And let me add my personal welcome and thank you to the proud families and friends joining us from across the country and around the world — whether in person or virtually.

Graduates, let’s give them a round of applause!

For a number of you, there are also friends, colleagues, and family members you are missing today, whose love and support helped bring you to this place. We remember them as well. 

Acknowledgments

If friends and family helped make this long journey possible, there is another group that made it incredibly worthwhile. The members of our faculty and staff whose support (and occasional, or even rather frequent, critique) helped you to meet the level of excellence required for a UW–Madison graduate degree.

Faculty and staff, will you please stand as you are able? Let’s give them a round of applause!

I want to call upon two groups of people for special recognition.

If you are receiving a graduate degree today as a member of the first generation in your family to go to college or earn an advanced degree, please stand as you are able and make some noise. Congratulations!

If you are a veteran or serving on active duty or in the Reserves — family and friends, I’m talking to you, too — please stand as you are able so that we may thank you for service.

Thank you all.

Some of you know that the Air Force ROTC just celebrated 75 years on our campus, and I want to make special note of one outstanding graduate from that program:

Lt. Col. Daniel Jackson is an Air Force pilot and historian who’s deployed nine times and has flown more than 1,000 combat hours. His research has helped to locate two U.S. aircraft missing in action since 1944, and his team is now in the process of recovering and returning remains to families that have waited 80 years for answers.

Today Lt. Col. Jackson earns a PhD in history, but Air Force duty called so he could not be here — let’s give him a long-distance round of applause. Dan, thank you for your service and congratulations!

Excellence and goodness

Graduates, you are here because you have completed an advanced degree. And every one of you has, I suspect, teachers who have deeply influenced you along the way. You will remember some of these teachers for many years. Sometimes you will realize only far into the future precisely how, and how much, they’ve touched or influenced you.

For me, one of those teachers is a man named Guido Calabresi. A law professor and eminent scholar, and then a dean, and later a distinguished judge.

He taught me in a required course in my first year of law school, and he was my own law school dean. I enjoyed his class, and learned a lot, but it was only many years later, when I became a law school dean myself, that I fully appreciated his leadership in that role.

Recently, Judge Calabresi, now in his 90s, made this observation about universities:

“A great place that trains leaders must train people who are not just excellent, but loving, kind, humane, and good.”

Now, this may not be an entirely new take on the role of universities. After all, Plato spoke about the character-building role of education more than 2,000 years ago. And Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. wrote in 1947:

“We must remember that intelligence is not enough. Intelligence plus character — that is the goal of true education.”

But still, I think it’s an especially relevant observation in this moment. So, I want to speak to you today about not just excellence, but the extraordinarily powerful combination of excellence AND goodness.

You are stepping forward into a world marked by complexity and change, which are as old as civilization itself. But the pace of change continues to accelerate.

Within this acceleration there are immense challenges. Challenges to how we work … how we govern … how we educate … even how we relate to one another.

Yet, alongside change — and the stress and uncertainty it generates — there are equally extraordinary opportunities for innovation … for contribution … and — perhaps most importantly — for connection.

A generosity of presence

The poet David Whyte has written about what he calls a generosity of presence.  This phrase has been on my mind this spring, because it speaks both to what universities like this one are uniquely able to cultivate and to what I believe our nation and the world very much need in this moment.

To build authentic connection to others requires a generosity of presence. A willingness to listen with the generosity and authenticity that creates the possibility of adjusting your own view, or someone else’s view, of an issue … but even more importantly, it creates the possibility of changing our views of each other.

That is the best way — indeed, perhaps the only way — to move forward at a time when building walls can feel a whole lot easier than building bridges.

I know many of you have felt that over the last few months.

On a campus that has welcomed students from around the world since our very first class in 1848 — and that takes great pride in the number of global leaders with UW–Madison degrees — we have had international students and new alumni, including some of you here today, living with concerns about the stability of their lives here.

And simultaneously, the future of the compact between universities like ours and the federal government to conduct scientific research is now in more doubt than it has ever been since its creation after WWII.

This too has, or threatens to have, an impact on a great many of you, especially those of you who may be looking to continue teaching or conducting research within universities.

It may mean fewer graduate students trained, or fewer postdoc or faculty positions. Fewer discoveries made. Fewer clinical trials leading to treatments and cures for diseases. And fewer university innovations spinning off into companies that create jobs and drive the economy.

To be sure, cuts to funding for research are not new — they’ve happened under Democrats, and they’ve happened under Republicans.

And a questioning of faith in democracy, something that we are certainly seeing now, is not particularly new either. That’s been building since you were children.

Seventy percent of the generation born before WWII considered it essential to live in a democracy. Fewer than thirty percent of Millennials and Gen Z-ers do today.

In short, this is a world that badly needs your intelligence, expertise, skills and talents, AND your generosity of presence. Because no matter what your background or beliefs, or political persuasion, you are graduating into a world that urgently needs not just your excellence, but also your goodness.

Character and pluralism

One of the things I admire about Judge Calabresi, my former teacher, is his equally deep commitment to ideas and to people. We need people equally committed to both, and as advanced degree graduates of UW–Madison, you have the training and experiences for precisely that.

We need people who can juggle opposing ideas, and people willing to challenge their own strongly held beliefs and assumptions, and to do it in a way that connects with others.

We need people who can discuss a polarizing issue with someone on the opposite side without needing to prove the other person entirely wrong.  And people who understand that you can work together productively on something important without having to agree on everything important.

And let me be clear: This is not to say that all beliefs are equally valid. Truth, and rigorous engagement with evidence, matters, and matters greatly. (For me that’s foundational — after all, I’m a law professor and an evidence scholar!)

But we will not reach a place where we can engage with those different from us without a genuine, and generous, effort to understand their worldview. For a diverse democracy to flourish, and for the best new ideas, innovations, and inventions to emerge, we need to be able to work together, even when we don’t entirely agree.

You are ready for that. You have worked hard. You have debated. You have collaborated. You have had classmates from all over the globe, with a plethora of backgrounds, identities, and beliefs. You have learned from one another with generosity of presence, and you have shown us both your excellence and your goodness.

I’m pleased to say that the individuals we’ve selected to receive honorary doctoral degrees today — one a Democrat and one a Republican — are also living exemplars of this creed.

Donna Shalala and Jim Sensenbrenner credit some of their most important accomplishments to their ability to reach across the political aisle, or to connect with those different from themselves.

That is worth celebrating. And it’s also worth celebrating that universities like ours are one of the few places on earth where people of such different disciplines and different perspectives — people from small rural towns and major cities, of different races and genders and beliefs, come together in an intentional way.

To paraphrase Walt Whitman: We contain multitudes.

People like Shane Hoffman, who grew up in rural Wisconsin, a hunter and snowmobiler … and now a doctor.

Today Shane becomes the first person to graduate from the new accelerated program at our School of Medicine & Public Health aimed at addressing the dire need for physicians in rural areas. The new curriculum is condensed, streamlined, and focused on training physicians to work in rural areas of Wisconsin that are underserved.

Shane, where are you? Thank you and congratulations!

And Chris Caldwell, who today receives a PhD from the Nelson Institute for Environmental Studies. As a proud member of the Menominee Indian Tribe of Wisconsin and president of the College of Menominee Nation, Chris added an important perspective to our work on climate change and sustainability.

President Caldwell, where are you? Congratulations!

As you head off into your next chapter, it may sometimes feel far easier and more comfortable to retreat into your bubble. I urge you not to do that. And I urge you to be wary of the easy acceptance of indifference and even cruelty toward people who are different from you.

Conclusion

The sociologist Eboo Patel, the founder of Interfaith America, who visited our campus earlier this spring, wrote this:

“Let’s think of America not as a battlefield where we defeat our fellow citizens, but instead as a potluck supper where we invite everyone’s contribution.”

That can be cacophonous at times, but it’s also necessary for the kind of sifting and winnowing that sparks new ways of thinking about problems.

And it works best when we cultivate a generosity of presence so we can live together with mutual respect even when we disagree.

So: Let us be united in holding fast to our dual commitments to excellence and goodness, just as my old teacher, Guido Calabresi, recommended.

Let us be generous about ideas, and generous with each other. And if you do that — and you are so very well prepared to do exactly that — I know that you will be entirely capable of navigating whatever challenges lie ahead. Go forth and build on all you have already achieved, and know that we, here at UW–Madison, will continue to cheer you on at every step.

Congratulations, graduates … and On, Wisconsin!