OPINION: Degree earners seek knowledge, beauty, truth

By Osvaldo De Leon
Guest Columnist
Published Tuesday, May 17, 2022

A letter to future graduates:

If you are reading this, it is because you are or will be a future graduate from a university. Let me begin by saying congratulations on your accomplishments in your academic career. Not everyone gets to have such a privilege like you.

In fact, your unique attainment is not common in the history of the world. Degrees were given to the few intelligent and curious-minded, like yourself. Throughout your academic career, you majored in a discipline that made you happy, and eager to pursue knowledge, beauty and truth. These transcendental ideals made the University a place where the individual cultivates his/her mind and soul.

Let me say why.

First, knowledge is only acquired by learning it and keeping it in one’s mind. Beauty is the quality that gives pleasure to the senses or exalts the mind. And finally, truth is the aspiration to know right from wrong through the civil discourse in great books and ideas, which thus shape your mind and soul. These three words represent what you are, not just as a graduate, but as a human being.

Never forget the people who helped you in your academic career. That is, always give thanks for having professors who enlightened your intellect and shaped your thinking about different aspects of life. Your family is the first and foremost important institution of a free society; be thankful for having parents or guardians who supported you throughout these years because without the family, there wouldn’t be a society of great persons like yourself. With all this being said, I congratulate you on this unique moment of your life.