President Lesley Hallick has announced that philosophy professor Dave Boersema will be the graduation speaker at this year’s commencement.
Boersema will also be ‘graduating’ into retirement and he said that he is humbled to be asked to speak for the graduating class of 2016.
Boersema said that he was recently asked by President Hallick to speak at graduation and that the speech will run between five to six minutes.
“It’s really an honor and I’m, in a way, graduating too so I can relate to the students,” Boersema said.
Boersema has taught at Pacific for 31 years and started his long career at Pacific in 1985.
Boersema is the author of nine books, the founder of the Center for Peace and Spirituality and the Executive Director for Concerned Philosophers for Peace.
When asked what he has planned for life during retirement Boersema chuckled.
“I’d like to spend a lot of time in my hammock,” Boersema said.
While he still wants to stay active, he said that he does not have any specific plans for his retirement but being a house husband and staying active in the academic community.
Boersema said that he hasn’t started writing his speech yet, but he is pondering ideas.
He said that the day is not about him but about the students and he is glad that his speech can be short so it does not take away from the graduates.
“I hope I am not deadly dull and the speech is something appropriate and not boring,” Boersema said. “Hopefully we will have nice weather too.”
He said he wants his speech to sound too preachy because that is similar to lecturing and Boersema said that the graduating class had four years of lecture so he does not want his speech to bring the classroom to the stage.
“I want to make a connection and make sure that students can reflect upon the time they spent here,” Boersema said.
He said that he does not want to be the stereotypical speaker that starts with the definition of commencement and so on and so forth, but he wants his speech to be something that can resemble the changes that students go through from the moment a student starts college to the time they walk across the stage.
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