Editor’s note:
Following are remarks by former Secretary of State Madeleine Albright from Sunday’s university commencement at Kenan Stadium, which was attended by some 28,000 people. The University Registrar has estimated 5,481 expected graduates: 3,039 bachelor’s, 1,314 master’s, 397 doctoral and 731 professional degrees and certificates. Among those receiving honorary degrees were Albright, two-time Nobel Prize winner H. Jack Geiger, Tony Award winner William Ivey Long, former U.S. Secretary of Education Richard Wilson Riley and Dean Smith, basketball coach and mentor.
From Albright’s speech:
“Today is a day of joy and for anticipating the future with optimism, yet in our high spirits we cannot help but be conscious of shadows. Closest to home is the knowledge that tragedy is inseparable from life. This past March, you lost an irreplaceable member of your class. We all feel the absence of Jason Ray. More broadly, around our country and around our world, we mourn the loss of innocent lives to hurricanes, tsunamis, disease and — as the horror at Virginia Tech reminds us — the demons that sometimes infect the human mind.â€