Under clear blue skies and surrounded by towering oaks, Linfield University honored the Class of 2025 in a joyful and heartfelt commencement ceremony Sunday morning on the university’s McMinnville campus. Several thousand friends, family members, alumni and guests gathered in the Oak Grove to celebrate more than 470 graduates during the university’s capstone year-end event.
The ceremony began at 10 a.m. and marked a significant milestone for the graduates, who represent 16 states and three countries outside the United States. In addition to the undergraduates, nearly 50 students earned graduate degrees in business, nursing or sports science and analytics.
In her welcome remarks, Interim President Rebecca “Becky” Johnson praised the Class of 2025 as the first in five years to experience college without the disruptions of the COVID-19 pandemic. She also emphasized the importance of human connection in a rapidly changing, tech-driven world.
“A chatbot can generate text, but it can’t replicate the conversations you had with your professors after class,” she said. “An algorithm can process data, but it can’t walk with you through hard times, like your friends, roommates and coaches here have.”
The program included remarks from several speakers with deep Linfield ties: Lucinda Day Fournier ’95, chair of the Linfield University Board of Trustees; Tracey Kebede-Berhanu ’07, representing the Alumni Leadership Council; and graduating senior Kayla Hudock ’25, selected as the student speaker. Together, they reflected on the graduates’ journeys and the university’s legacy of fostering deep connections that will last graduates’ entire lives.
The commencement address was delivered by Nicholas Kristof, two-time Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist and Yamhill County native. Kristof, who grew up just miles from campus and began his journalism career at the News-Register in McMinnville, shared insights drawn from his decades reporting on global crises and his deep roots in rural Oregon.
He noted that for many Linfield students, this ceremony marked their first formal graduation, because the pandemic had disrupted a large number of their high school commencement ceremonies.
“And look around,” Kristof said, gesturing to the blue sky and Oak Grove canopy, “This is glorious.”
Kristof reflected on divides in society — urban and rural, conservative and progressive, those with college degrees and those without — and encouraged Linfield’s graduates to become bridge-builders across the fault lines.
“What we need is the humility to listen as well as to speak, to avoid caricatures of those we disagree with, to cherish nuance as much in the real world as in the classroom,” he said. “We need to recognize that we can learn from people we disagree with.”
He also marveled at the makeup of Linfield’s graduating class.
“An incredible 45% of you are the first in your families to earn a college degree. That’s an extraordinary figure. It’s one of the highest rates of first-gen students in the country,” Kristoff said. “Linfield truly is an engine of opportunity for this community and this state.”
Kristof urged graduates to find purpose, to mentor others and to find ways to improve the world they are inheriting.
“We are an amazing species,” he told the graduates. “Sure, we make mistakes. But when tested, we are capable of incredible strength and resilience and courage and decency. That is more likely when led by people who combine education with a strong sense of moral purpose. People who are comfortable with complexity. People who are escorted by humility and hope. And that’s you. All of you sitting there today in the class of 2025. You give me hope.”
After the conferring of all degrees, faculty and staff recessed first to form a gauntlet the newest Linfield University alumni then walked through on their way to meet family and friends. The faculty and staff members applauded their former students, celebrating the end of one chapter and the beginning of nearly 500 new ones.
“Congratulations, graduates,” said President Johnson in her closing remarks. “We are proud of you. Now go show the world what it means to be a Linfield Wildcat.”
