Michelle Obama Gives Commencement Speech
Michelle Obama said that in America “we don’t build up walls to keep people out” as she delivered the commencement address on Friday at City College in New York.
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS on Publish Date June 3, 2016. Photo by Sam Hodgson for The New York Times. Watch in Times Video »In tones both aspirational and political, Michelle Obama on Friday used her last commencement address as first lady to salute graduates of the City College of New York as “living, breathing proof that the American dream endures,” while also criticizing “name-calling” leaders who engage in “anger and intolerance.”
Mrs. Obama did not specifically mention Donald J. Trump, the presumptive Republican nominee for president. But her intent could not have been clearer as she warned that “leaders who rule by intimidation — leaders who demonize and dehumanize entire groups of people — often do so because they have nothing else to offer.”
“Here in America, we don’t give in to our fears,” she told the class of 2016, with its 3,848 graduates, in an outdoor ceremony on the college’s Manhattan campus. “We don’t build up walls to keep people out because we know that our greatness has always depended on contributions from people who were born elsewhere but sought out this country and made it their home.”
For Mrs. Obama, the address, the last of her three commencement speeches this year, was intended to highlight several issues that have been dear to her, including public education and immigration. Noting the college’s proximity to the Statue of Liberty, she said there was “no better way to celebrate this great country than being here with you.”
Mrs. Obama’s commencement address at City College, the flagship school in the City University of New York system, was the latest high point in its long, distinguished history. In 1847, it was founded as the Free Academy of New York, with a mission to provide an education to anyone, at low cost.
But her visit also came at a precarious time for the CUNY system, which has been troubled by overcrowded classes, shrinking course options and budget cuts, as described in a recent investigation by The New York Times. Faculty members and employees represented by the university’s biggest union, who have worked without a raise for six years, recently voted to authorize a strike in the fall if no contract deal was reached.
Indeed, dozens of faculty and students on Friday morning handed out fliers to people filing past security to enter the campus, in Upper Manhattan, urging public officials to invest more money in the system.
None of the speakers at the commencement directly addressed CUNY’s woes. But in her 24-minute address, which elicited frequent and enthusiastic applause, Mrs. Obama said that “public education is our greatest pathway to opportunity in America. So we need to invest in and strengthen our public universities today, and for generations to come.”
At several points, she mentioned notable immigrants, or the children of immigrants, who had attended City College, including Jonas Salk, Ira Gershwin, Colin L. Powell and Andrew S. Grove, the former Intel chief executive, who died in March. But she also applauded the valedictorian and salutatorian of the graduating class, who delivered rousing addresses on the importance of diversity and the hard-fought battle to break cultural barriers.
Mrs. Obama added some personal perspective, as well:
“It’s the story that I witness every single day when I wake up in a house that was built by slaves, and I watch my daughters — two beautiful, black young women — head off to school, waving goodbye to their father, the president of the United States, the son of a man from Kenya who came here to America for the same reasons as many of you: to get an education and improve his prospects in life.”
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