On Monday, June 6, the department held a graduation celebration at the wǝɫǝbʔaltxʷ Intellectual House with our graduates, faculty, family and friends. We were thrilled to be able to hold it in person and celebrate our graduates with applauses they could hear, rather than clapping-hand emojis. Congratulations to the ninety-six Bachelors of Arts, four Masters of Arts, and five Doctors of Philosophy of the class of 2022!
The ceremony included a speech by alumna Mary B. Whisner, B.A. Philosophy 1977, UW School of Law, Librarian, Public Services. Mary thanked the families for supporting their students as they pursued their degree in philosophy, which she assumed they pursued because, like her, they enjoyed questioning things. She wished the graduates the best of luck upon reaching this milestone, serendipitously in the same week as she reached the milestone of retiring from the UW. She assured them that the values and habits of studying philosophy, the skills of debating ideas, reaching decisions, and explaining your positions would come in handy throughout life no matter what career they pursued. She wished them best of luck as they went out into the world with those powerful habits of mind.
Undergraduate student speaker Townsend E. Rowland reflected on his philosophical education at the UW and how valuable it was to him, and thanked the faculty and graduate students who made it possible and challenged them all. He wished his fellow graduates the best of luck and said he was certain that their years of study together had prepared them to examine and improve the world around them.
We hope all of our graduates will take our speakers’ words to heart and use the skills they learned in their philosophy classes to positively impact our society and their own lives.
Congratulations, Class of 2022!