May 28, 2015
Refract and Redefine
Greetings to Dean Frenk, Dr. Ramsammy, distinguished members of the faculty, alumni, fellow graduates, and our friends and family who provided each of us with immeasurable support. I am truly honored to welcome you.
After reflecting upon my time at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, I realized that we were all led here by an experience or person who inspired us. For me, it was my Grandmama Sarah. When I was in elementary school, my family would visit my grandmother in the Mississippi Delta. When I helped her pick row upon row of collard greens in her massive backyard garden, I saw a woman who was once silenced by racism and violence, but who prevailed to raise five children, complete a master’s degree, and become a profound educator who provided a voice for others. She always said that I too was going to be a public servant who would give a voice to the silenced.
My grandmother passed away from cancer while I was in college, and I realized there were many mechanisms at work that had shortened her life, especially a social environment that systematically harms health.
It was this realization that led me to public health. Public health provides us with a profound way to understand and address some of the most intractable problems in human existence and improve the health and longevity of generations and generations to come. Like a prism that refracts a beam of light into a spectrum of color, this school refracted our gifts and talents into distinct areas of expertise. It has equipped us to help cure infectious diseases, reduce chronic illness, and improve social policy. Now we can work in our communities to refract negative health exposures into life-giving outcomes.
In the next phase of our careers, if we are to continue to find innovative solutions that will improve health, we must redefine our approach. We need to tap into the full spectrum of human diversity: our sex, gender, race, ethnicity, nationality, class and spirituality.
I think about Alice Hamilton, Harvard’s first female professor who became part of this school in the 1920s. She was excluded from many university events, was not allowed in the Faculty Club, and could not participate in academic processions at commencement (like today). Yet her arrival redefined what scholarship looked like on campus, and her passion for social justice extended from her pioneering research in toxicology to practices that improved the safety of all workers.
Like my Grandmother, Alice Hamilton, and many others, we have the potential to transform seemingly inescapable trajectories. Class of 2015, I thank you for your commitment, and I challenge you to continue to be refractors and redefiners, so that one day future generations, including my 2 year old daughter, will share our story and ensure the voiceless prevail. Thank you.
Photo: Kent Dayton
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Commencement video
Commencement slideshow
Commencement photo gallery
Award winners
Loan relief awards help students address public health disparities
Commencement Eve photo gallery
Dean Julio Frenk address
Alumni Association President Anthony Dias address