Sustaining Hope by Giving Thanks
(Graduation is coming! Let Us Give Thanks!!)
No doubt about it, 2025 has been a very difficult year for all of higher education, and for our students, faculty and staff. The times in which we live seem to pose dangers at every turn; our national government takes perverse delight in cruelty to so many people, whether immigrants or government workers or people on boats who have become targets for obliteration. At times like this, we wonder whether we can feel gratitude — and yet, we must!
Instead of focusing on the many reasons for concern these days, let’s take the time this week to refocus on what gives us hope, joy, and cause for real thanksgiving.
Let’s be hopeful for our students. If a Trinity education means anything, it is our belief that what we do here can lift up communities, families and even the nation in positive ways. We have famous exemplars of the results of a Trinity education over the years — our famous alumnae like the great Speaker Emerita Nancy Pelosi ’62, and the thousands of others who may not be famous but who are changing lives for the better each day as teachers, nurses, advocates and activists, writers and journalists and lawyers and so many other professionals. Let us give thanks for all those Trinity graduates who give meaning to our mission every day! And let us use those examples to encourage our students to persist, to believe that they, too, can be change agents for the future.
Let us give thanks for the Sisters of Notre Dame who started this revolution in women’s education 127 years ago!
Let us also give thanks for the generations of faculty and staff who have worked so hard to make Trinity a beacon of hope and enlightenment across the generations. The success of our students depends on the work of our faculty and staff every single day. Thank you!
Let us also give huge thanks for the very generous benefactors who have provided millions of dollars in financial support for scholarships, buildings and endowment. In today’s competitive world of higher ed, having sufficient resources is vital to sustain excellence. We are so grateful to all of our great benefactors. Thank you!
Finally, let us also give thanks for all of Trinity’s friends and partners out in the community — those who provide internships and clinical placements for our students, those who welcome our staff to programs and provide advocacy support for financial aid and other issues in Congress, those who bring us together in professional convenings to explore the critical issues we all face in higher ed today. We can’t do this work alone. We are grateful to our vast community of friends who support us along the way.
We have much to be grateful for this Thanksgiving — THANK YOU to all!!
Happy Thanksgiving!
