The Dillard tradition is for graduates to walk down the Avenue of Oaks. They look forward to this day for their entire career. Well, this year it rained- hard and for days. So we had to decide to find a new location, one indoors that would seat everyone. So we moved to the UNO arena where we had about 3,700 attend. So despite the initial disappointment, the crowd made the graduates forget about the change, as did our powerful speaker, Jeff Johnson. He reminded them that walking down the avenue was not most important, but where they go after Dillard.
I enjoyed my first commencement, and realized that I knew a good number of the graduates. This is simply one of the best days of the year when you talk to families of students and you can see their joy.
The Prez
