The morning of Sunday, May 7, saw worship, praise and congratulations at the Gilbert-Lambuth Memorial Chapel at Paine College, as the school held its Convocation Ceremony for the Class of 2023.
The proceedings at the historically Black, Methodist college were bolstered with a prayer by Joseph Washington, a Paine alumnus and an educator a C.H. Terrell Academy, and a scripture reading by Augusta Commissioner Tony Lewis.
Logan Crawford, senior class president of the Class of 2023, encouraged her fellow candidates to have confidence in their achievements as they prepare for their careers.
“As we return home with our tassels and degrees, remember this: the degree you receive today is your insurance policy, with the premium paid in full by the hard work over the past years we’ve spent here,” said Crawford. “The value of that policy? It depends on how much effort you’ve put into your education, and what you want to do with it.”
Crawford also urged graduates to persevere amid troubled times with the phrase “restore your roar,” drawing on experiences shared among classmates over the past four years.
“Think of the time when COVID happened, and we weren’t promised the chance to graduate,” she said. “But aren’t we here? We finally finished, and restored our roar.”
Paine graduated 22 students in 2023: two in the Humanities, five in the Social Sciences, 14 in Business Administration and one from the Mathematics, Science and Technology Department.
The class valedictorian is Ch’Erykah Dunn, who earned her bachelor’s in business administration, a major she shares with the salutatorian, Arieyana Zachery.
HBCU Change, a financial technology company with the aim of raising money for historically Black colleges and universities, donated $10,000 to Paine College, presented by the company’s president Rufus Montgomery.
The convocation’s keynote speaker was Michael Thurmond, CEO of DeKalb County, Ga., and chairman of Paine’s Board of Trustees.
Thurmond also had praise for the students’ resilience, calling the Class of 2023 the most “consequential, significant and historic class that Paine College has had,” since its first graduating class in 1886.
“You started in ’18 and ’19, when Paine College was in the midst of a financial crisis, in the midst of an accreditation crisis; you continued in the midst of a worldwide pandemic,” Thurmond said. “A million didn’t make it, but you are the ones who did.”
Skyler Q. Andrews is a staff reporter covering business for The Augusta Press. Reach him at skyler@theaugustapress.com.
