<p>a Convocation address should not be a policy speech. Very disappointing, considering she has a lot of life experience she could have talked about without getting into this kind of thing. It has nothing to do with what she talks about (I actually agree with her on more than one point), it's the fact that it was not the forum to promote her political agenda.
Speaker</a> Nancy Pelosi | News Room | Speeches
<a href="http://cornell.edu/video/?VideoID=740%5B/url%5D">http://cornell.edu/video/?VideoID=740</a></p>
<p>well, she’s a liberal, she’s gonna talk like a liberal.</p>
<p>Liberal is just a category, not a specific sequence initiator.</p>
<p>The address was given at a college. College is liberal.</p>
<p>What a disappointing convocation speech. It was complete political rhetoric & totally egocentric. Moreover, there was nothing motivational, inspirational or thought provoking for the graduates. Pelosi threw out a few names of famous female Cornell graduates, but did not speak to the graduates themselves. I’m not a Pelosi fan, but I expected she’d rise to the occasion.</p>
<p>I agree that she started out emphasizing her accomplishments too much, but I felt she pulled it back and focused on Cornell/Life at the end.</p>
<p>It was certainly not a great speech, but she is one of the most powerful people in the country, second in line for the presidency (god forbid we should lose both Obama and Biden) and a historic figure for being the first female speaker of the house.</p>
<p>So although her speech may not have been great, or even maybe very good, it was impressive to have her as a speaker, which is sometimes a problem for Cornell because it does not give honorary degrees.</p>
<p>I thought Skorton was excellent at graduation, and boy was that one “gorges” day weather wise.</p>
<p>From the graduates’ viewpoint, I’m not sure if having her as a speaker was impressive. More importantly, since this was graduation weekend, it would have been better to have a less “impressive” speaker who imparted some words of wisdom, encouragement, etc. to the graduates. The convocation speaker should leave the graduates with something to ponder & talk about…that certainly didn’t happen. Many convocation speakers are quoted long after the graduation. What’s Nancy’s quote: “Science, science, science, science” when she talked about the future? I wonder how all the non Science grads felt!</p>
<p>Yes, Skorton spoke well & the weekend was so well organized and well run.</p>