Carter, Reno among speakers at 242nd Commencement

The sun was shining brightly, the Met Life blimp was drifting lazily overhead and a slate of noted dignitaries from science, politics and the arts was seated on stage. Students and administrators could hardly have asked for better conditions than those the morning of May 18, the University's 242nd annual Commencement. With graduates from the University's 12 undergraduate and graduate schools seated on Franklin Field and thousands of family members and friends looking on from the stands, University President Judith Rodin welcomed those assembled by invoking Penn's rich history. "You sit where some 10 generations of Penn-educated men and women sat before you -- men and women who have used their Penn educations in their professions and their communities," she said. And it has been approximately one generation since the University has had a Commencement speaker of the same stature as this year's visitor, former President Jimmy Carter. The last commander-in-chief to address Penn graduates was Carter's predecessor, Gerald Ford, who spoke in 1975 while still occupying the Oval Office. Meanwhile, many of the other individual schools' graduations also featured top-name speakers from the ranks of government, media and business. Interim Provost Michael Wachter introduced Carter at Commencement as the "ideal of service" and praised him for his strong record on human rights. During his one term in office, Carter created new educational programs, engineered the Camp David peace accords between Israel and Egypt and signed an arms reduction treaty with the Soviet Union. Since leaving office in 1981, Carter, 73, has been involved in a host of causes aimed at promoting human rights. He volunteers annually with Habitat for Humanity and through the Carter Center -- founded in 1982 -- works to monitor elections and eradicate disease in underdeveloped regions of the world. Carter, who grew up in the segregated South, called upon the graduates to free themselves from the familiar patterns and practices of prejudice. "The worst discrimination on earth is rich people versus poor people," he said. "It is very rare that we break down the chasm between us who have everything and those who don't." Drawing upon his travels to 125 countries over the last 17 years, the former peanut farmer called upon those in attendance to break from their "encapsulated environment[s]" and "transcend" the status quo. "We should continually expand our minds," he said. "There is a need for every individual human being -- including Penn graduates -- to remember this." Turning to current events, Carter -- whose post-presidential diplomacy has helped stabilize regions from Haiti to North Korea -- used the recent nuclear brinkmanship in South Asia to call for American moral leadership in the new world order. "I would hope that our country can see that our example is the greatest threat to death, destruction and war," he said. Carter was indirectly affiliated with the University even before he received his honorary Doctor of Laws degree Monday. In his speech, he made note of his relationship with University Board of Trustees Chairperson Roy Vagelos, whose Merck Pharmaceuticals Inc. has provided the Carter Center with drugs, free of charge, that have cured tens of millions of Africans of river blindness, a parasitic infection endemic to the area that causes blindness in its victims. Carter's wife Rosalynn was to receive an honorary degree, but could not attend due to an illness in the family, according to University Secretary Rosemary McManus. Children's author Maurice Sendak also did not come due to a family illness. Rodin said at the ceremony that she hoped to be able to award Carter and Sendak their degrees at a later date. Those who did receive degrees honoris causa were former U.S. Court of Appeals Judge Arlin Adams, opera singer Jessye Norman and Frank Moore Cross, one of the world's foremost experts on the Dead Sea Scrolls. Genetics researcher Francis Collins and Nobel Prize winner Stanley Prusiner -- a College and Penn Medical School alumnus -- received their degrees a day after speaking at the Medical School's graduation ceremonies. And when Rodin introduced Federal Reserve Board Chairperson Alan Greenspan -- whose wife, journalist Andrea Mitchell, is a College of Women alumna and a University Trustee -- the contingent of Wharton School graduates applauded loudly for the "guardian of the purchasing power of the U.S. dollar." Beginning with the School of Arts and Sciences and ending with the Annenberg School for Communication, graduates from each of the 12 schools were recognized by their deans for their accomplishment and hard work. Rodin announced the degrees presented by each school on behalf of the trustees and praised all graduating students for their "commitment to all that is good in knowledge." The other gatherings of graduation weekend featured a slew of other top dignitaries. Mitchell, the chief foreign affairs correspondent for NBC News, spoke at the multi-faith Baccalaureate service in the Palestra the Sunday before Commencement. "The challenge for you -- both men and women -- is to invent a better way," she said, reflecting on the atrocities and prejudice she had witnessed in her travels. "Be mediators, helping to channel ideas into constructive compromise. Hold onto your passion for justice." Also calling upon the graduates to be advocates for "a more peaceful society" was U.S. Attorney General Janet Reno, who spoke to nearly 300 degree recipients at the Law School's graduation ceremony. Due to the possibility of a last-minute cancellation, school officials did not announce Reno's selection until about a week before the ceremony. However, the 59-year-old Harvard Law School graduate put aside official matters to look at the lighter side of life, even joking about parodies of her on Saturday Night Live. Philadelphia Mayor Ed Rendell, a 1965 College graduate, came home to give the keynote address at the College graduation. Balancing humorous anecdotes about the study habits of his son Jesse -- an incoming member of the Penn class of 2002 -- and a serious message of community service, Rendell spoke to spirited applause. "You can change anything," he said. "You might not be able to change it as quickly or as completely as you want, but you can change anything."