Good morning and congratulations! I stand before you today with mixed emotions, excited to be here speaking to you on this momentous occasion, but at the same time I realize that in just five short months I will be sitting where you are.

Today you have accomplished what only a select few ever will. Four or five years ago as most of you came to Mississippi State University, 59 percent of high school graduates went on to college. Less than half of those have actually made it to graduation day. I remember my freshman year a teacher telling me to look around my classroom. He said, "Look to your left. One of the two of you probably will not graduate." So today I say congratulations to you, the ones who made it.

If you who are graduating today follow in the pattern of our previous graduates, someone in this room may become a famous author, a world-renowned athlete, a gifted scientist or engineer, the president of a prominent corporation, or you may start your own company, create your own way, and add your own name to our proud list of alumni who have made their mark on this world. Many of you will become leaders in your local community, state, nation, and even the world, and we will all take pride in one day saying, "Didn't I go to school with him or her?"

The degree you are receiving today is a culmination of all the knowledge you have attained and all the lessons you have learned over these past four or five years. And the degree you are receiving today is one to be proud of.

Mississippi State University is the largest in the state with over 16,500 students. It is ranked as one of the best in the nation for superconducting power. It is home to one of 34 National Science Foundation Engineering Research Centers, and has one of the largest and strongest honors programs in the country. Mississippi State University has again been named one of the 100 Best Buys for public colleges and universities by Kiplinger's Personal Finance magazine. We have been named a Truman Honor Institution because of the number of Truman Scholars that have come from our great university. Our academics are at an all-time high. Our athletic program could not be any stronger. And the caliber student that is now attracted to our university is tremendously high.

What I have said so far is what you would expect to hear at your graduation. You should be proud of yourself. You should have great satisfaction with your degree, and you should be grateful to your university. And all of these things that you came here expecting to hear are true. But what most commencement speakers cannot say is that they relate to how utterly terrified you are right now. Despite the proud and confident smile you show, most of you are trembling inside at the thought of now leaving Starkville and the Mississippi State family to head out into the real world. Most of you will be leaving your closest friends and the place you have come to call home.

Willie Morris, the famous Mississippi author, wrote in his book, My Dog Skip, "Why, in childhood and youth, do we wish time to pass quickly? We want to grow up—and yet again we do not. This is the way people are, and have always been, even before the telephone, television, electricity, jet airplanes, and fax machines. You want to grow older, and yet you don't. Can anyone explain it?"

Mr. Morris, I can't explain it. I can only say that that time is here when we have grown up. We can no longer yearn for the days of high school, or then of college, or then of graduation. We are here, and we have agreed to accept the nostalgic challenge of looking back. There are times in life that we set aside for reflection and remembrance, and what we find during these important moments in each of our lives shapes the way we face the future.

What we find when we look back over the past five years at Mississippi State University are fond memories. We look back and remember the tears and the laughter and the stress and the pain associated with growing up. And you remember the drive that made you finish. You remember those people who told you that college would be the best years of your life and the anticipation you felt as you arrived here in your car packed with high school annuals and prom pictures. You remember the first time you pulled an all-nighter trying to study, and the first test you bombed. You remember our athletic teams and our trips to the College World Series, the Final Four, and the SEC Championship.

You remember your first taste of freedom and being away from home, and you remember how lonely it really felt the first night by yourself in the dorm. You remember trying to decide if you wanted to change your major again—or go back to the one you started with. You remember the first friend you made at Mississippi State and being overwhelmed at how big this place really is, and you probably laugh at how much you have changed since then. You remember thinking about your future—but not for too long—because the real world was still so far away. You remember that feeling you got when you realized you only had a few weeks left here and you wish that all those people who had told you that college would be the best years of your life had told you that it would one day come to an end.

With the great diversity of this graduating class, we will not all have the same memories from the same perspective. We come from different races, different religions, and different backgrounds. We were born in different countries and came to college at different ages. So while graduation day is a time of reflection, it is a unique day, for it bridges the gap between yesterday and tomorrow. We need to look back and remember both the good and bad times here, to search our souls and discover our true strengths and understand our weaknesses.

But, you cannot dwell too long on the past because there are exciting opportunities that await you when you walk out these doors today. It is our time to take the lessons learned and experiences gained at Mississippi State and march forward. We have attained the skills to make a difference in this world. It is our time to take the opportunities we have been given and look to the future. We will rely on our experiences, our confidence, our gifts, our faith, our memories, and our education, and we will make of ourselves exactly who and what we want. There are uncertainties and an unknown abyss that could capture us if we allow it. But, we will not because Mississippi State in all of its grand simplicity has taught us that there are better things in this world that need our attention. You have been given the ability to succeed, so be excited, energetic, and willing.

My charge for you today is to recall fondly your own memories and to be proud of what you have accomplished here, but don't make your home there. We cannot make our mark in the world based on our past laurels. Those who truly succeed in life seize the opportunities that are presented to them, and they take the risk to achieve greatness. Take advantage of what you have been equipped to do and good luck accomplishing every goal you desire.

Student body president Jenny M. Reeves, a senior from Oxford, is the second woman to lead student government in MSU's 122-year history and is believed to be the first to deliver a commencement address. Reeves is an Ottilie Schillig Leadership Scholar and a John C. Stennis Scholar in Political Science. She will graduate in May.