Nearly 750 Graduates Earn Degrees at Commencement

Kansas City’s Municipal Auditorium was buzzing Saturday with loved ones cheering on the almost 750 graduates at Rockhurst University’s commencement ceremony.

The ceremony was the first in Municipal Auditorium since 2019, as the 2020 commencement was held virtually and the 2021 event outside, at Children’s Mercy Park.

As if that weren’t enough of a distinction, it was also the final commencement ceremony for the current University President, the Rev. Thomas B. Curran, S.J. For many, the occasion was perhaps bittersweet. Speaker Emily Dickson, a nursing major who delivered remarks on behalf of the undergraduate population, thanked Fr. Curran for playing a part in her own journey — her college career was capped with the Catholic rite of confirmation, a conversion she said began in Fr. Curran’s Catholic social teaching course. But alongside — and part of — those big moments are countless “ordinary moments” that are also important, she said.

“As I look out at all of you, I see brothers and sisters and friends, I see moms and dads, I see first-generation college students and amazing nursing students going after their second career,” Dickson said. “I see people still figuring everything out and people who think they have it all figured out. But mostly, I see that under this truly impractically shaped cap, we all hold millions of ordinary, unexamined moments that have brought us here today.”

Delivering remarks on behalf of graduate students was Joseph Straws, a Doctor of Physical Therapy degree recipient. Straws praised the faculty who guided he and his classmates to this moment, who exemplified the Jesuit core values, and who encouraged he and others to take time and reflect on it all. Straws in turn called on the graduates to continue that reflection.

“Look around you, the friends and family you see are part of your story. They are here today to support you because they believe in you. They believe in your power and your spirit, in your intelligence and your potential,” he said. “Believe in yourselves today. Have faith that you are where you are for a reason and that that reason will make a positive impact on someone’s life.”

As part of the ceremony, the University announced the Senior Gold Medal, awarded to the graduate or graduates with the highest cumulative GPA. This year’s recipients are Christine Crowell, Jailyn Griffith, Brooks Hanson, Joseph Heinrich and Zoe Nason.

In closing remarks to the graduates, Fr. Curran invited the graduates to return to campus, invoking the story of how, during the renovation of Sedgwick Hall, crews discovered that the trees outside the building had caused it to sink as they grew to collect the resources they needed — namely water — to survive. The solution was not to remove the trees or to move the building. It was to create an irrigation system for the trees and correct the issues with the building’s foundation — to create harmony rather than competition. In a society where conflict seems inevitable, he said the story of Sedgwick Hall represents another path.

“There you will be reminded of how we are to live, as a beloved community of companions, journeying towards the end for which we have been created, union with a God who loves, blesses and sustain us,” he said.