2019 Commencement Address

Congratulations, class of 2019! This is your own very glorious day. As I look around you—even into the distance of this great hall—I see the beaming faces of your friends and family. All, including your professors here on the podium, take pride in your accomplishment.

I want to welcome all of you: families, friends, our faculty and administration, SUNY and F.I.T. trustees, honorees and distinguished guests. I want to offer a special welcome to our colleagues from Istanbul Technical University who join us today to celebrate the 13 students who graduate as part of F.I.T.’s dual degree program with I.T.U.

Each person who is here today adds to the joy of the moment for our graduates. I would like to take you back now to another joyous moment. It was Christmas eve—50 years ago—When one of the greatest gifts to me…to you…and you…and you…to all of humanity really…reached down to us from the heavens. It was then that human beings orbited the moon for the first time—three astronauts in Apollo 8—and from that distance, we heard them say: “In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth…and God saw that it was good.” Soon after, we earthlings saw what inspired them in a photograph they transmitted: the earth, our lovely, lonely earth…a tiny blue sphere—floating alone in the black depths of space.

Imagine seeing that image of earth for the very first time—how awesome and humbling and disconcerting it was “to see the earth as it truly is,” wrote the poet Archibald MacLeish, “small and blue and beautiful in that eternal silence where it floats, is to see ourselves as riders on the earth together, brothers on that bright loveliness in the eternal cold…” (Forgive the politically incorrect language. It was a half-century ago.) But that image was timeless…and the awe it inspired still holds. Or does it?

It has been 50 years and how have we treated that gift from the heavens? I think we all know the answer to that. How many times have we seen pictures of polar bears or penguins struggling to survive as ice disappears in the arctic? That is just a small fraction, a symbol, really, of the havoc we humans have caused to our lovely earth…the “only home we have ever known,” as it has been called.

Up to one million plant and animal species are now at risk of extinction, according to a landmark global report issued by the United Nations earlier this month. The report not only assesses the drastic ways in which we people are altering nature, it also links the way in which this decline in biodiversity is eating away at our “economies, our livelihoods, food security, health and quality of life worldwide.” Land developers…miners…ivory poachers…illegal loggers and fishers…industrial polluters…and a human population passing 7 billion…all have put unprecedented pressure on our natural resources. Bees and butterflies become collateral damage to pesticides and bug zappers. Our own fashion industry notoriously adds to water pollution, greenhouse gas emissions, soil degradation and rainforest destruction.

I haven’t even mentioned global warming, which, according to the report, is a major driver of mother nature’s dramatic decline. Throughout the world, we have heat waves and hurricanes, droughts and wildfires, all in unprecedented intensities and numbers. I don’t mean to depress you on a day that should be reserved for celebration. So I will stop…because, well, pessimism does no good…and oddly enough, despite this grim picture, I still have hope.

I have hope because I know that solutions abound. They abound in the labs of scientists… in the research of economists and agronomists and urban scholars…in the creativity of environmental activists and in the will of caring, civic minded communities eager to make the world habitable for the generations to come.

Heroes abound as well…from Rachel Carson, whose 1962 book The Silent Spring created the platform for today’s environmental movement…to Yvon Chouinard, the pioneering entrepreneur who early on created the eco-friendly Patagonia brand. Just the other day, winners of an annual environmental prize were announced, six brave souls from around the world whose persistent, personal campaigning saved large  patches of tropical forests, local waterways, the nearly extinct Balkan lynx and the Mongolian snow leopard. Heroes…each and every one.

And then, Class of 2019, we have you. Indeed, more than anything, I have reason to hope because of you. You see, everything we know about you—as a generation—points to great promise. You are the most educated…most techno-
literate…most ethnically and racially diverse generation in our history. You are empathetic, empowered self-starters…who most of all, have a passion to make a difference in the world. For that reason, you are sometimes called the “change” generation, and since polls tell us that you rank “climate change” as the greatest challenge of the coming decades…I have hope. Young as you are, you are already developing startups to clean the oceans and stop illegal logging. You are volunteering at high rates for environmental causes. And almost 60 percent of you say you want to work in sustainability. You love Tesla…and solar panels and wind turbines…and consciously try to buy from brands that value sustainability.

Closer to home, thanks to you and some of your predecessors, F.I.T. was just listed as one of the Top 10 Sustainable Fashion Schools in the world. You are my heroes. Your leadership behind our residence hall composting system…your drive to recycle…the natural dye plant garden that you tended to...the clothing and accessories and toys you created from recycled materials or organic matter…the sustainability pop-up shop you operated…the sustainability courses you squeezed into your crowded schedules.

In your time with us, you became the best friends our bees have ever had…you not only maintained their hives up on our roofs. You also acted as their ambassadors, conducting bee education programs throughout our city’s parks. You have helped F.I.T. reduce its greenhouse gas emissions by 55 percent. And this is just the short list.

You inspire us—all of us in the F.I.T. community. The U.N. report—dire and disturbing as it is—nevertheless offers a fragile branch of hope and says—it is not too late to make a difference. If that is the case, then I urge you to act—and act with all of the energy and creativity and conviction that you have demonstrated at F.I.T. You are the change generation. Make it your mission in the years ahead to practice green values in your homes, your communities…In the companies you will come to lead. We humans are capable of so very much.

Last month, another photograph arrived from outer space—over 53 million light years away. It was an astonishing first-time ever photo of a black hole—a cosmic phenomenon thought forever to be “unseeable”—and yet there it was…the product of human ingenuity, of ten years’ worth of diligence and commitment...and optimism. So…aim high: aim towards the galaxy from which an astronaut can once again look down at this tiny blue sphere that we occupy and say—without pain or irony—“…and God saw that it was good.”

Class of 2019, I wish you good luck and Godspeed.