Harvard’s live ceremony will be postponed for the second year running.
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Harvard’s 2021 graduation ceremony will be virtual. University President Lawrence Bacow announced today that live commencement exercises will be postponed indefinitely for the second consecutive year.
“[P]ublic health and safety concerns must take precedence,” he wrote in a letter to the Harvard community. Though circumstances may improve by May 27, the date the ceremony is to be held, he said, “it take months of planning to prepare for our usual festivities, which draw to campus and to Cambridge thousands of people from around the world.” Added Bacow, “please know that one day we will welcome the Class of 2020 and the Class of 2021 back to campus for an unforgettable—and unforgettably joyous—Commencement.”
Harvard will award degrees online this year and deliver diplomas by mail. Each school will have its own “virtual event,” said Bacow.
On a FAQ page, the commencement office advises celebrating families not to travel to Cambridge. But graduates can order regalia and create their own photo ops at home. This year the Harvard Coop is offering a “special keepsake gown” made of 100% post-consumer recycled materials.
Harvard’s announcement comes as colleges across the country are announcing their 2021 commencement plans. Schools in states with lax Covid restrictions, like University of Florida, have said they intend to hold live ceremonies with precautions like physical distancing and masks. In California, where Governor Gavin Newsom has been cautious about opening the state in the face of severe spikes in viral transmission, Sacramento State University is planning a “CARmencement.” Grads are encouraged to decorate their vehicles and drive across campus where they can listen to live music and speeches.
Ruth Simmons, the president of Prairie View A&M University, a historically black college near Houston, will be Harvard’s principal speaker this year. In 2006, she was considered a contender to head Harvard. The daughter of a Texas sharecropper, she earned a doctorate in romance literature from Harvard in 1973. She was the first African American and the first woman to head an Ivy League college when she served as president of Brown University from 2001-2012. Before that, she was the first African American woman to head a major U.S. college, when she became president of Smith in 1995.
Simmons, 75, “has a unique perspective on how very different types of institutions contribute to the fabric of our nation,” Bacow wrote.
She testified in defense of Harvard’s admissions system at a high-profile federal trial where Harvard prevailed in 2019. A federal appeals court subsequently affirmed the lower court’s finding that Harvard’s consideration of race in admissions did not violate federal civil rights laws. Yesterday the non-profit anti-affirmative action group that brought the suit, Students for Fair Admissions, filed a petition to review the decision in the U.S. Supreme Court.
Last year’s Harvard commencement speaker was Martin “Marty” Baron, the executive editor of the Washington Post. He is stepping down from that job on February 28.
Founded in 1636, Harvard held live commencements every year since 1780 until 2020 In 1721 and 1751 deadly smallpox outbreaks forced ceremonies to be cancelled. And during the American Revolution, when fighting was concentrated in Massachusetts, Harvard canceled commencement from 1774 through 1780.
