Heard at Cornell is a column that regularly quotes important statements from Cornellians. This excerpt is taken from President Kotlikoff’s 2025 Commencement Address delivered on May 24.
“Division has frequently been part of our American society, where the right to think, believe and speak as we will is among our most cherished freedoms. Democracies are not intended to be places where everyone always agrees. But what they do require to succeed is a shared understanding about how we disagree. How to discuss differences, honestly and in good faith, with knowledge and facts, and with respect for those with whom you differ.”
“Today, our nation is confronting old differences amplified in new ways. New technologies designed to bring us together instead are pulling us apart. Each of us is invited in a thousand ways into a private world built only for us, where we hear only the opinions we agree with.”
“Ezra’s and Andrew’s plan, for a university where any student can find instruction in any study aimed to create the opposite experience. To invite young minds into a community, a community of shared experiences that didn’t insulate students from difference, but instead invited them, perhaps for the first time, to experience it.”
Later in his address, he said:
“At Cornell, we’ve tried very hard to maintain a house united. Stress can either pull a community apart or make it stronger. The ability to overcome difference and to avoid division lies in our ability to listen to each other and stay true to our values and our principles.”
“‘Any person, any study’ is our expression, at Cornell, of those values: our commitment to a community of diverse individuals who can work together on anything they decide to pursue.”
