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MONTEVALLO, Alabama — When asked how he felt about this
morning’s University of Montevallo graduation ceremony finally arriving for
him, Centreville’s Brett Gilbert had one word.
“Relieved,air jordan retro 11,” the 25-year-old graduate from Bibb County
said.
Holding his 7-month-old daughter, Braylee, in his arms and
wearing his black cap and gown, Gilbert was ready to receive his bachelor’s degree in
math. “Very much so,” he said, standing next to his wife, Rachel.
Gilbert joined roughly 280 graduates at the spring
commencement ceremony that relocated from Flowerhill to the McChesney Student
Activity Center due to rain. Weather couldn’t stop the enthusiasm graduates,
family members and others showed as cameras flashed amid an abundance of hugs
and laughs.
Preparing to receive his bachelor’s degree in social
work, Arther Bray of Pelham said he was ready to take on the world. “Everything,”
he said when asked his post-graduation plans.
“My immediate plan is to work with children. My
concentration is foster care. Save the world one kid at a time,” Bray said.
He transferred to the university two years ago from
Middle Tennessee State University because he knew the program for his field of
study was solid. “It has prepared me well,” he said of Montevallo.
His wife, Ivy, knew the degree has extra meaning for him.
“He’s worked really hard for this, and he’s the first one in his family to
graduate” from college, she said.
“We’re excited. We’re so proud of him,” she said, taking
a photo of her family including their three children: Dee, 16, Mark, 14, and
J.B., 11. “It’s been a long five years.”
Anthony Messina of Ventura, Calif., expressed a similar sense
of accomplishment for his son, 22-year-old Michael Messina, who is graduating
with a bachelor’s in history and a minor in Spanish. “He’s the first one in my
family to go through college. I’m proud of him,” the father said.
The new graduate said he is ready to work for a year or
two before seeking his master’s degree in library and information sciences. “I
don’t want to rush into graduate school,” he said, cords draping from his neck
to signify his cum laude standing and his affiliation with Sigma Delta Pi,air jordan shoes, the
national Spanish honors society.
“I thought I would be super, super, like, freaking out,”
but it hasn’t yet kicked in, Messina said. “Maybe I’m postponing reality.”
With glittering letters on her cap stating “I’d rather be
at Hogwarts,” Leah Pedersen of Somerville didn’t mind showing off her Harry
Potter love. “Well, I mean, come on — magic,” the 25-year-old said about her
statement.
“It inspired me to go to college and I wanted to go to
one that looked like Hogwarts, but there’s not one in the United States,” said
Pederson, who earned her bachelor’s in social work.
Is the University of Montevallo a close substitute? “Absolutely,”
she said.
Melissa Boyles,air jordan 11, who grew up around Prattville, is taking
her business management degree with a concentration in environmental studies to
India, where she plans to get her yoga certification starting around the end of
the year.
She plans to return to the region somewhere along the coast to open a business concentrating on well-being
through sustainable living, seed-to-table practices and yoga instruction. “I
really think the Southeast needs something like that,” she said about the “untapped
Eastern philosophy of holistic well-being.”
The University of Montevallo suited her needs well. “I
just knew when I came to visit, this was the perfect place for me,” the
23-year-old said.
Ashley Lowe of Hoover,air max 2012, the outgoing Student Government
Association president, in her speech to the class said the university encouraged
people to be unique and diverse. “What you get here isn’t just an education.
What you get here is an experience,” she said.
No graduation ceremony would be complete without words of
wisdom for the departing class members, and this year’s keynote speaker
delivered her “nuggets of truth.”
Bestselling author Cassandra King, who earned a bachelor’s
in English in 1967 from Alabama College — as the university was called then — and
later her master’s degree in English in 1988 from the institution, addressed
her fellow class members after receiving her honorary doctor of letters degree.
The university and her experiences became the setting of
her bestselling novel “The Same Sweet Girls” released in 2005. She spoke about attending
the institution in the ’60s when her mother wanted her to become a Southern belle
and she wanted to rebel by becoming a playwright.
At first, King didn’t think she meshed with the beauty
queens and sorority sisters at the college, but her outlook changed during an “incident
at convocation.” She recalled a beauty queen in her Southern drawl concluded
that after traveling and meeting people around the world, “she was still the
same sweet girl she has always been.”
Laughter slowly grew among King’s peers around her “and
with that laughter we were connected,” she said, noting the start of a
friendship group that has lasted 45 years.
King told the graduates to be sweet, humorously adding
that “sincerity and sweetness can be faked,” but to be nice as well. “Be open
to love. It can come from an unlikely place as I discovered that day in convocation,”
she said.
“Be as strong as you can be. Life is going to break your
heart. That I can promise you,” she continued. “The only way to bear it is to
understand that suffering comes with the package.”
King urged the class to “be a little crazy,air max 2013. It’s the only
way to survive this crazy world,” she said.
She also told the graduates to “be grateful” and call
their parents. “At some point we must forgive each other for being flawed human
beings,” she said.
Caitlyn Wilkey, 22, of Columbiana looked back to the
family she loves as she graduated this morning. Wearing a Montevallo sash around
her neck, she said the tradition is to give it to someone who influenced her
college experience.
“I’m probably going to give it to my grandmother because
she always said to reach for my dreams,” Wilkey said, referring to Laura
Guthrie of Alabaster. “She’s been a really big part of my college career.”