By Cate Brown

On May 17, 2020, 500 SIPA students will graduate without the pomp and circumstance that normally mark the achievement of a graduate degree and a transition back into the working world. Instead of gathering on the steps of Low Library to listen to Darren Walker, pop champagne, and greet family members from around the world, the SIPA class of 2020 will be left to activate pre-recorded ‘Graduation’ from the quiet of their own homes. 

None of us could have predicted a global pandemic. None of us could have anticipated that Friday, March 13 would have been our last day to walk through a crowded “fishbowl,” and exchange passing remarks with a friend. And of course, it was rarely the remark that meant something: the crowds, the cordial gestures, the elevator grumbles, and the friendly and yet impersonal PAW Print queue: These moments were just the metronome counting off our collective days. 

Beneath the surface, something more profound would happen, if you opted in. Friendships formed. Political and ethical debates took hold. We became invested in each other’s success. And those relationships that started as cordial, deepened into collegial. Eventually, hours of group work outweighed initial differences, and by the end of two years, true friendships formed, regardless of party affiliation, or often in spite of it.

I want to build a Yearbook, by the Class of 2020, for the Class of 2020. In this Yearbook, every member of our class is invited to share a couple of memories, as well as a personal statement about what they hope or believe for the future. I’ll collect your submissions in this Individual Submission Form (if you’d rather have a Zoom party and submit a page with close friends, you can find a Group Submission form here). And then I’ll work with a small team of graphic savants to create a Yearbook that we’ll publish on May 17. I have wonderful help already -- Ruby, Martina, Alejandro, Jackie, the Sean(s) -- but if you’d like to get involved, please send me a note. We’re hoping to collect all of the content by May 4.

Building our own Yearbook feels right. If you’re like me, you’ve likely been disappointed by the leadership of SIPA’s senior administrators. If I were enrolled another year, I would be leading a conversation with the office of Dean Janow, and I would be asking: How is it that I am about to graduate, and I’ve never heard you speak? How is it that one Fireside Chat and one Dean’s Challenge feels adequate? As a young female policy student, I’m proud that our internationally-ranked program has a female leader, so what could I learn if I knew more of your story? SIPA is a school for public leaders, and yet our own senior leadership team feels woefully absent and we must ask management classes to sub-in for a veritable leadership curriculum. I wish the school would reimagine our engagement with both.

At the same time, the absence of an engaged leadership team may have been SIPA’s greatest gift: I’ve watched 400 classmates mount a petition to support tenure for the beloved security policy professor Dipali Mukhopadhyay. I’ve seen classmates mobilize support for a more adequate pandemic response (lest we forget our $60 prorated ‘Student Activities’ reimbursement; should we also ask for our printing per diem?). And I once helped lead a 200-person survey of SIPA’s core curriculum, in hopes of raising awareness about the strengths and shortcomings of our management and economics programs, only to be rebuffed by the Curriculum Committee. 

Maybe this is what SIPA always intended to show us: how to translate our beliefs and our values into action. How to build unlikely allies, circle around a vision and then never let up. If this is a conscious strategy, thank you. I will never forget it. 

Now SIPA Class of 2020, let’s maintain our affinity toward action and let’s build ourselves a book. We’ve put a hell of a lot of work into the past two years, and we deserve a commemoration. Send us your memories, we’ll send you back a Yearbook, and on May 17, we’ll see you all on Zoom. 

Cate Brown is a Human Rights and Humanitarian Policy concentrator, with a focus on journalism; she is an advocate, writer, educator, and friend, graduating very - too - soon.