2012 Convocation Speech by Provost Neil Weissman

August 26, 2012

Like all others present, I welcome the class of 2016 to the college. But not you alone. I also welcome new faculty and administrators.

If you enter our founding building Old West from the east side, you will find a plaque. It is not dedicated to Benjamin Rush. Nor to John Dickinson. Nor to our first president. Nor, I will quickly note, to the first provost. Rather the plaque is dedicated to James Ross, Dickinson's first faculty member, who came here after studies at Princeton University to teach Latin and Greek.  

Introduction of new faculty and administrators at any convocation held when Ross arrived would of course have been simple—there was one. Not so this year. The 61 new appointments are listed in your program on pages 4 and 5. They are as impressive in quality and training as they are in numbers. The faculty represent all divisions of the curriculum - humanities, social sciences, and natural sciences. They come not only from across the United States, but also from Africa, Asia, the Middle East, and Europe. The new administrators support such activities as facilities including new construction, financial operations, student development, and institutional research. I ask them all to rise together for your greeting and applause.

It is appropriate that Dickinson, an institution that strives for excellence, should begin its convocation by recognizing achievement. In this regard, I would like to call your attention to two sections of the program. The first, on page 3, identifies faculty who last spring were awarded tenure or promoted to the rank of full professor. The second section, which stretches from pages 5 to 7, lists outstanding student achievers. These are students who have been selected for one of the awards the college bestows in various fields of endeavor—awards which in several years many of you in the class of 2016 will be winning.  

I leave it to you to examine these lists later, but one faculty member and two students deserve special note today. Each year at Commencement one professor receives the Ganoe Award for Inspirational Teaching. This is particularly prized by faculty because it is the result of a secret ballot of the graduating senior class. The 2012 award winner was Daniel Cozort, professor of religion. Please join me in recognizing him today.

The two students who we also specially recognize today are our "sophisters." This title is not commonly used elsewhere (it will set off your spellcheck!). For us, the term means scholar or thinker. 

The Junior Sophister is the member of the junior class who at the end of two years of study has achieved the highest cumulative grade point average. This year's junior sophister is Ailin (or as she likes to be known, Kia) Pipkingabay. Kia comes from Buenos Aires, Argentina, and majors in theatre & dance. Her faculty adviser writes of her, "Her enthusiasm for learning is infectious, and her presence in class raises the bar higher for everyone. She is a naturally inquisitive and talented artist who is consistently challenging herself creatively. When I think of Kia, I think of enthusiasm and an individual who is full of joy of life and hungry to learn and grow." Her first-year seminar instructor remembers her as "one of those students who you know is there to learn everything she can; she always did more than required." Our new students will be interested to know that in addition to her seminar on Ideas That Changed the World, Kia took dance, acting, German and astronomy in her initial semester. This fall she will be studying in Dickinson's program in Hyderabad, India—hence, she is not with us today. Nonetheless, please join me in congratulating her.

The Senior Sophister is the member of the senior class who at the end of three years of study has achieved the highest cumulative grade point average. This year's senior sophister is Christina Socci. Christina comes to us from Pine Brook, New Jersey, and is an English major. Her advisor describes her as "a brilliant writer" but also a "wonderful reader and critic." She studied last spring at the Dickinson Program in Toulouse. In addition to her class work there, Christina volunteered as an English assistant at  SUPAERO, a prestigious Engineering School, and she completed  an internship with La Dépèche, a local press agency. Our Toulouse program director writes, "She represents the perfect example of a global citizen that Dickinson College wants to promote ... intelligent, curious, dynamic, [and] attentive to others. ...  She definitely engaged Toulouse and France." In her first semester here, Christina's seminar was entitled Galileo's Commandment, a seminar that dealt with how the arts view science. She also took French, astronomy and fundamentals of music. I would point out for you first-year explorers who are happily undecided about your major—none of these starting courses were in Christina's future major. Her first-year seminar instructor writes in words that all of you incoming students should take to heart, "Christina is the kind of student who will drop by just to say "hi" long after you are no longer her adviser. Not to ask for a reference or a second opinion on something ... Just to say "hi". One of those that make it worth the effort." Please join me in congratulating her.