Osler's Razor

There is something really special about commencement-- it is too rare that we celebrate accomplishment in such a public way, and this is a thing we teachers get to share with those we have worked with for years.

As I hoped and expected, Dean Melissa Essary gave a wonderful commencement address. As she spoke, it seemed very natural and obvious that she would be a dean, given her command of that sort of event and intellectual presence. These graduates are a group that have made many good decisions, and their choice of Melissa as speaker was one of the best.

There was also an excellent speech by the top graduate, Ashley DeForest. She is from a town near Cottonwood Falls, Kansas. Before orientation, I always pull up the admissions files of entering students so that I can call on them in orientation, bringing out something of themselves. The point, really, is that you aren't anonymous at Baylor Law, that we will know you. At this group's orientation, I called on Ashley and asked her what you would see if you looked down the main street of Cottonwood Falls. She said, correctly, that you would see the courthouse pictured above, which I have loved since the first time I saw it on a drive from Minnesota to Waco. In her speech today, Ashley recalled that moment, and then spoke about that courthouse in exactly the way that I have thought of it-- that we lawyers need to be like that courthouse, standing tall and proud on the plains.

And, yes, I took pictures. Those will be coming up...