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Class act
Rx for a wired generation: only connect

By Hope Green

Less than 48 hours before, they had piled mountains of twist-tied bags and boxes into dorms and said goodbye to anxious parents. Now BU’s newest students marched en masse onto Harry Agganis Way, trading looks of bemusement and bravado and sensing, all of a sudden, a need for decorum.

	President Westling addresses thousands of freshmen and transfer students assembled in the Armory. Their next gathering as a class will be at Commencement 2004. Photo by Kalman Zabarsky

"Please remove all baseball caps," came the directive through a bullhorn as almost 4,100 freshmen and more than 200 transfer students funneled slowly into the Armory on September 4, "and turn off your pagers and cell phones before entering the building."

Thus the class of 2004 was ushered into its Matriculation ceremony, and whether or not the reality had sunk in, into a new phase of adulthood. The message from the sidewalk seemed to reverberate inside the former cavalry shed as speakers counseled the newcomers to respect the traditions and embrace the opportunities of higher education, and when appropriate, go technology-free.

"Unplug yourself," said James Collins, speaking on behalf of the faculty. "Instead of sending an e-mail message . . . visit your professor in his or her office. Engage him or her in debate about some topic raised in class.

"Do not resort to one-click scholarship," added Collins, ENG professor of biomedical engineering, University professor, and winner of the 2000 Metcalf Cup and Prize for Excellence in Teaching, as he warned against the perils of an unregulated Internet. "Make your way over to the old bricks-and-mortar structure known as the library . . . In the academic realm, the World Wide Web is the wild, wild, West."

High achievers

Setting new records for the University, almost 60 percent of the newcomers graduated in the top 10 percent of their high school class, and 93 percent graduated in the top quarter. In the aggregate, they scored 264 points higher on the SAT than the national average, and their high school GPA was 3.5.

But being smart is not enough, President Jon Westling was quick to point out. Nor is their mission chiefly to learn how to "strategize and scheme as if to prepare for a stint on Survivor.

"Those of us who teach and work at Boston University do not believe that learning and character are separable," he said. "We know that what you study will change how you look at the world and therefore how you act in it. The trick, then, is to ensure that over the course of your undergraduate career you slowly become the kind of person you respect."

Melting pot

The class of 2004 continues a tradition of cultural diversity at BU. Its members represent all 50 states, 2 U.S. territories, and 67 foreign countries. Many of those who assembled at Matriculation will not see their parents for months. But as Dennis Berkey, University provost and dean of Arts and Sciences, explained, the word matriculate is derived from the Latin word mater, or mother, and on an intellectual level that is the role BU will play in their lives.

"You are about to enter into a relationship with this University that is in some ways similar to that between a parent and a child," he said. "Within these classrooms and laboratories your abilities will be shaped and nurtured."

Delivering the alumni allocution, Jenna Silber (UNI’98) spoke from her own experience to reassure students that they would find a sense of direction. She described embarking on a fitful search for "the one thing I was meant to concentrate upon." Later, she said, she realized her success and fulfillment depended more on character than on career plans.

"A liberal arts education cultivates a kind of singlemindedness I had hardly imagined before coming to Boston University," said Silber, a doctoral candidate at the University of Chicago’s Committee on Social Thought. "It challenges you to be faithful to the depths of the human mind, and rewards you with a world with which you are thoroughly involved, a world that is intricate, hopeful, and meaningful."

7 February 2001
Boston University
Office of University Relations