COW Class of 2025 welcomes future challenges with confidence
The College of Wooster’s 155th Commencement Ceremony took place inside the Scot Center on Saturday, May 17.
At The College of Wooster’s 155th Commencement Ceremony for the Class of 2025 on Saturday, May 17, the community gathered inside the Scot Center, and more than 450 graduates celebrated commencement.
In her commencement address, international development leader and alumna Mesky Brhane, ’89, credited the liberal arts foundation from her Wooster education with providing confidence to venture beyond comfortable boundaries in today’s world, a theme that resonated throughout the words shared in celebration on Saturday morning.
In her opening remarks, President Anne McCall raised up the Class of 2025 for all they have achieved since joining The College of Wooster, encouraging them to ask questions, imagine possibilities, undertake challenging projects and generate knowledge.
McCall encouraged the graduates to follow in the footsteps of Brhane, now regional director of the Planet Middle East and North Africa region at World Bank, whom she awarded with an honorary Doctor of Laws.
In her address Brhane spoke of her work, answering the question of how her Wooster degree in French and English prepared her to address economic challenges through practical approaches including addressing soil fertility, water infrastructure and sustainable fisheries.
“The answer lies in what Wooster truly taught me,” Brhane said, “not just subject matter, but adaptability, critical thinking and the confidence to venture beyond comfortable boundaries. My liberal arts foundation didn’t prepare me for a specific job; it prepared me for any job in a rapidly changing world.”
Brhane recognized the challenges today’s graduates face and urged them to take confidence in that same Wooster education.
The theme of becoming comfortable with the uncomfortable, moving forward with purpose and drawing from what they learned was shared by speakers from this year’s senior class.
Sam Peppers, ’25, a political science major and religious studies minor, had the opportunity to share the invocation for his class this year.
“May we remember all the valuable lessons which Wooster has taught us, subtle and profound,” he said, “that discourse and compromise do not undermine our values and that critical thinking and knowledge themselves are virtues and the cure to the sickness of prejudice.”
Physics major and senior speaker Karmellah Buttler, ’25, said, “As lifelong learners and independent minds, working together, I hope that you will use your talents and brilliance to intentionally improve the lives of others around you.”
After the class was welcomed to the community of Scots alumni by Chuck Nusbaum, ’02, president elect of the alumni board, the ceremony also featured a benediction from Wooster parent and pastor at Mendocino Presbyterian Church, Rev. Matthew Davis, and a musical performance by Brianna Swinford, ’25.
A psychology major and music minor, Swinford performed “Defying Gravity” from the musical and motion picture “Wicked,” accompanied by keyboardist Toni Arnold Shreve. And finally, the college’s pipe band led the traditional recession of graduates before they met their families and college community members to continue the celebration.