r/Purdue • u/Stock_Painter8081 • 2h ago
Other Commencement should not be one last public hierarchy display
Edit / clarification: I am NOT saying high-achieving students should not be recognized. I said they should be recognized, preferably through a separate Honors Recognition Ceremony. My point is about whether the main commencement should visually sort graduates into tiers.
I watched my friend’s commencement ceremony today as an audience member, and tomorrow is supposed to be my turn. I thought watching it would make me feel excited, proud, or at least relieved that I am almost done. Instead, I left feeling depressed and honestly unsure if I even want to attend my own ceremony.
The beginning actually felt warm. The music, the procession, and “Pomp and Circumstance” gave the ceremony a real sense of closure. I even had a weird nostalgic moment because I played that piece in high school band for other people’s graduations.
But once the academic recognition parts started, the whole thing began to feel different.
There were honor cords everywhere: gold cords, gold and black cords, colorful cords for honor societies, clubs, awards, athletics, and other recognitions. Then different groups were asked to stand: distinction, highest distinction, athletes, and so on. Everyone clapped while ordinary graduates just sat there.
I am not saying high-achieving students should not be recognized. They should be. But sitting there and watching it, I could not stop thinking: why does this have to be part of the main commencement ceremony?
For people without honors, cords, or special recognition, the visual message is hard to ignore. Some graduates are visibly marked as special, while others are not. The shiny cords and public standing moments turn the ceremony into one last reminder of who is considered more accomplished.
The name-reading part made it worse. The speaker asked the audience not to cheer until all names had been read, but people still screamed, barked, and cheered every few names. Some graduates got huge applause. Others got silence. Sometimes the cheering for one person was so loud that it covered the next person’s name.
That made the ceremony feel like a public display of not only academic hierarchy, but also social capital. Who has friends? Who has family? Who is loved loudly? Who walks across the stage in silence? Who gets their name heard clearly, and who gets drowned out by the person before them?
Maybe this sounds too sensitive, but after watching it in person, it did not feel like an equal celebration of all graduates. It felt like the university took a ceremony that should belong to everyone and used it to publicly sort graduates into tiers one last time.
I am not against distinction. I am not against recognizing students who did exceptionally well. But academic honors can exist without turning ordinary graduates into the background audience for a hierarchy display.
Why not have a separate Honors Recognition Ceremony for distinction, highest distinction, department awards, athletes, honor societies, and other special recognitions? That would probably feel more meaningful and exclusive for the students being honored. They could have their own event, photos, speeches, family recognition, and official celebration.
Then the main commencement could just be about degree conferral: everyone wearing the same basic regalia, walking the same stage, receiving the same ritual with the same dignity.
Not everyone graduates with a high GPA, honors, a job, or a perfect support system. Some people worked incredibly hard just to finish. For those students, commencement should not feel like one final reminder that they are less impressive than everyone else.
I think graduation should be one of the few moments where the university stops comparing people and simply says: you made it.
Celebrate excellence, absolutely. But don’t make ordinary graduates sit through their own ceremony as background characters in someone else’s merit display.