As they enter a world riddled with challenges, University of Michigan graduates must stand up and assume their roles as leaders, said Winter Commencement speaker Fred Upton, a former U.S. representative from the state of Michigan and a U-M alumnus, during his Dec. 14 remarks at the Crisler Center.
Upton, who earned a bachelor’s degree in journalism in 1975, told graduates his own U-M years unfolded against the backdrop of Vietnam and Watergate. It was such a turbulent time, he joked, that when he meets each new U-M president, he tells them the last time he was in their office was when students “occupied the place back in the ’70s.”
While acknowledging that the class of 2025 was stepping into a challenging era marked by complex problems and political gridlock, Upton said he is optimistic.
“The sun will come up, and we will get through these very troubled times, but only with your leadership, vision and involvement,” he said. “Consider that the torch is now formally being passed onto you.”
Approximately 1,000 graduates, along with nearly 5,000 family and friends, filled the arena, as faculty members and university leaders gathered on stage. The Registrar’s Office reported that 4,401 students from terms ending in August and December were eligible to participate in the ceremony.
Upton grew up in a family of Wolverines — his parents and grandfather attended U-M — and he followed suit. As a student, Upton was a sports writer and editor for The Michigan Daily, honing his skills in communication and inquiry and carrying those abilities with him to Capitol Hill. After early service as a congressional aide and White House budget analyst, Upton was elected to the U.S. House of Representatives in 1986, representing Michigan’s 4th Congressional District over 18 terms. During the ceremony, he was awarded an honorary Doctor of Laws.
Others who received honorary degrees during Commencement were:
- Diane Judith Nash, American civil rights activist, Doctor of Humane Letters.
- Robert Langer, biotechnologist, chemical engineer, chemist and inventor, Doctor of Engineering.
- Don Was, musician, composer and record producer, Doctor of Music.
Throughout his remarks, Upton returned to the theme of bipartisan problem-solving. He described how, over nearly four decades in Congress, he worked with colleagues from both political parties, saying voters in his swing district cared less about whether there was an “R” or a “D” after his name than about whether he listened and got things done.
Quoting abolitionist Frederick Douglass — “I would unite with anybody to do right and with nobody to do wrong” — Upton encouraged graduates to seek out coalitions that could move the country forward.
In a final rallying charge to the class of 2025, Upton told the graduates they could no longer think of themselves as a “leader of tomorrow.”
“You are a leader for today. You are the way forward. This is not the time to stand by; it is, in fact, the time to stand up. We need you — every one of you — more than ever today and every day,” he said.
President Domenico Grasso lightheartedly told the graduates that Dec. 14, 2025, would be a date they would always remember as “the first day you begin to forget everything you learned in college.”
But, borrowing from Mark Twain, he added, “what remains will be your true education.”
“What you learned here can never be taken from you. Your Michigan degree is part of who you are,” Grasso said. “Your ability to think creatively and critically, while communicating persuasively, will serve you for the rest of your lives.”
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Grasso also reminded graduates they are “among a fortunate minority on this planet to have had the opportunity to study, pursue your passions and earn a college degree,” and that with that privilege comes a responsibility to help others and strengthen their communities.
Quoting educational reformer Horace Mann, Grasso said, “Be ashamed to die until you have won some victory for humanity.” He linked that call to the university’s Look to Michigan vision, saying the phrase encourages society to turn to U-M graduates when seeking solutions.
“Remember: To whom much is given, much is expected,” he said.
In closing, Grasso offered this advice: “Develop and nurture a growth mindset. Stay curious. Keep reading and learning, especially about things with which you are unfamiliar. We do not stop being curious because we grow old; we grow old because we stop being curious.”
During her address, Laurie McCauley, provost and executive vice president for academic affairs, acknowledged that graduates were stepping into “a period shaped by extraordinary technological change.”
“Pathways that once seemed predictable now veer in unexpected directions, and the future no longer arrives in a straight line,” she said. “Many of you have a sense of the work you want to do. The question that lingers is how you might do it, when the tools and expectations keep shifting.”
While she noted the uncertainty this brings, she also pointed to the opportunity.
“Careers are built in times of ripe possibility like this: times when clear thinking, creativity and resilience matter as much, if not more, than technical expertise. Human connections, the kind you have learned to build here, will matter more than ever,” McCauley said.
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Two student graduates were also selected to deliver remarks: Kaylee America Rodriguez, graduating with a Bachelor of Arts in Sports Management from the School of Kinesiology, and Andrea Valenzuela, who earned a Ph.D. in Chemical Biology from the Horace H. Rackham School of Graduate Studies.
Rodriguez, a scholar-athlete on U-M’s softball team — and a cancer survivor who received the university’s Austin Hatch Adversity Award — told graduates she once imagined a straightforward path: “Graduate in 2024. Win a couple of rings.” Instead, she said, she was graduating a year later than anticipated “with a pixie cut and a subtle limp — a version of myself I never saw coming.”
“Life doesn’t always follow the plan,” Rodriguez said, “and sometimes a detour is where the beauty lies.”
She described how softball brought her to U-M as a first-generation college student, then her cancer diagnosis forced her to withdraw from school for a year.
“We don’t cherish what we don’t sacrifice for. Michigan gave me far more than a degree,” Rodriguez said. “It taught me that redirection isn’t failure — it’s a part of the journey. It’s the climb that defines us: the people we meet, the lessons we learn, the love we share, and the light we choose to give. As long as we’re breathing, there is always more ahead.”
Valenzuela spoke about completing her doctoral degree during a time of rapid technological change.
Standing “in a world louder, faster and more polarized than ever — one shaped by technology and opinions that often drown out truth,” Valenzuela said, reflecting on the rise of artificial intelligence. “We live in an age where artificial intelligence can write, analyze and even mimic empathy, but it cannot truly feel.”
She argued that the graduates’ greatest advantage is “being human and allowing ourselves to feel deeply,” even when those feelings are uncomfortable or overwhelming. Their generation’s privilege, she said, is not just their education but their awareness and capacity for compassion.
Valenzuela encouraged classmates to approach AI as a tool to “create, not to control” and “imagine, not to imitate.”
“The future isn’t written by machines,” she said. “It’s written by the humans brave enough to feel in a world that keeps trying to automate it away.”
As he addressed graduates, Faculty Senate Chair Derek Peterson reminded graduates that the freedoms they enjoy today were “won by the concerted efforts of organized and principled people — and they’re fragile.”
He shared the story of abolitionist Wendell Phillips, who visited Ann Arbor in the winter of 1860 to speak out against slavery. Local papers called abolitionists “fanatics,” and an angry crowd tried to drive Phillips out of town. But students from U-M’s class of 1861 determined that free speech must be protected, and they formed a protective wall outside the church where Phillips spoke.
In the months that followed, Peterson said 1,800 U-M students enlisted in the Union Army and 300 later died in the Civil War.
“Like activists in our own time and place,” Peterson said, “the class of 1861 put their lives on the line to defend free speech and advance the cause of justice.”
“Our history is full of victors valiant who have organized themselves against racism, who have risen to defend the humanity of suffering people in the plantations of the old South, in the concentration camps of Hitler’s Germany, in the townships of apartheid South Africa, and in the ruined cities of Palestine,” he said.
“It is these student activists who are, in fact, the leaders and best. They have built for us a tradition of commitment to struggle that stretches now over 200 years. This is the tradition that you, the graduates of the class 2025, now have the opportunity to take forward. Congratulations and Go Blue!”
