Inauguration Speaker Remarks

Welcome to this historic day! 

My name is Cynthia Archer. I am a member of Bryn Mawr’s class of 1975 and Chair of the Board of Trustees. 

We are gathered, colleagues all, to celebrate the inauguration of Wendy Cadge as the 10th President of Bryn Mawr College.   We are trustees, faculty, staff, students, alums, academic partners, friends, family and former presidents of Bryn Mawr… present here on this beautiful day and listening in from around the world. 

What is an inauguration?   In its best form, it is a coming together of our community to celebrate the election of our new President and to rededicate ourselves to carrying forward Bryn Mawr’s mission…

            to educate students to the highest standard of excellence and prepare them for lives of purpose… 

            to lift up others as they make a meaningful difference in the world...  

            to our core belief that ‘equity and inclusion serve as the engine for excellence and innovation...

            and to remind ourselves of the core values underlying our mission as we commit ourselves to support our new President in her leadership of Bryn Mawr College. 

 On this occasion, we can remember with deep respect all those who have preceded us in building Bryn Mawr since its inception, their efforts paving the way for us to take on our shared responsibility to move Bryn Mawr forward into an exceptional future… for ourselves, and for those who will follow us in growing, learning and working in this special place.   

As a community, we have searched for and found a leader who understands and deeply believes in the global importance of the liberal arts, who embodies the academic rigor and excellence that have been the cornerstones of Bryn Mawr’s long legacy and who has the courage to carry Bryn Mawr’s mission forward, fulfilling our generational commitment to uplift women, expansively understood, foster equity and access, and create sustainability for ourselves and for all Bryn Mawr community members to come. 

This is a joyful moment for us here today to express our confidence in Wendy’s leadership of Bryn Mawr.   We know we have welcomed into our community a brilliant and entrepreneurial scholar, an award-winning teacher and an accomplished leader and colleague.    

       It is also a moment to express our gratitude for her choice to join us as our 10th President.  The work of a President is both overwhelmingly immediate and profoundly durable, with every day fully scheduled and no day ever predictable. As our four former presidents gathered here today would attest, it is deeply meaningful work, and not for the faint of heart. The throughlines of their work and the affections of our far flung community are still palpable today.  Bryn Mawr has been fortunate for their leadership as we are now fortunate to have Wendy as our 10th President.  

         And so today, we can express our delight in welcoming among us a new leader who is up to the task…with a clear moral compass, an abundance of energy, refreshingly clear-eyed, endlessly curious, perceptive, funny and kind.  What a wonder!    

      Even in these early days, Wendy is thinking with us, learning with us, looking at Bryn Mawr through fresh eyes as one idea illuminates another …. in the way that our search committee discerned she would as we met and spoke with her and sensed how far we could all go together to carry Bryn Mawr forward into an exceptional future.                  

       In April of this year, the Board enthusiastically accepted the recommendation of our brilliant Presidential Search Committee and, pursuant to the authority granted by the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania to the Trustees of Bryn Mawr College, elected Wendy as the 10th President of Bryn Mawr College, to begin her term on July 1.  

     Today, on behalf of all trustees, with our gratitude to the thoughtful and inclusive work of this community, it is an honor and pleasure to celebrate Wendy’s election to the presidency of Bryn Mawr College, which confers upon her all the rights, authority and responsibilities pertaining to that office. We know she will use them well. 

   As trustees, we pledge Wendy our wholehearted support.  We believe Bryn Mawr’s future strength is calibrated by how we come together in harmony and in disagreement to aspire and move our community forward.  And we believe in the strength of our community to propel Bryn Mawr to new heights.     

   So I thank everyone here present and listening in around the world, as we join together in wholehearted support of Wendy and of Bryn Mawr College!  

Dear President Wendy Cadge,  
Welcome to your Freshman year at Bryn Mawr College. 
As the first leaves turn,  
And you scramble to find the right room, 
The right person to ask for help,  
New friends, new duties, a new step in life,  
You will have to grapple with a new set of rules; 
Our beloved traditions: 
Don’t split the friendship poles,  
Take care of when you walk down Senior Row, 
And leave your offerings to Athena.  

By your very first Lantern night,  |
You will wonder if you’ve just joined a cult.  
And by your first May Day, your fears will be confirmed.  

But until that day, as Autumn presses through the campus,  
You will pull at least one all-nighter.  
And on late, lavender latte fueled nights,  
Your head will pound  
As if something were trying to force its way out.  
You will cry in the common room, 
And you will lose your voice in the crowd by Taylor’s Bell 
And do it all again. 

We all find ourselves horribly lost.  

In your time of need, you may stumble to Great Hall.  
You may approach Athena, picture yourself as Perseus,  
Heracles, Jason-- prostrate, seeking 
The quick fix, the clever solution, 
But she will not answer.  

Make no mistake: 
She is very real, but her wisdom is never quick.  
Do not think yourself above such idle worship.  
She is not a thing to pray to.  
She is a way of seeing.  

You will walk down Senior Row, and you will feel her,  
In the sway of each leaf 
As it falls from its branch to the piles below,  
In an effortless dance. 

From the moon bench, 
She will catch you with a cold stare, and say:  
                     Look, Look
                              Exhaust the Little Moment. 

And by the time you reach the end and sit.  
You will see the lines of trees stripped bare.  
And you will see that you are a very small voice 
In a very large choir.  
The empty boughs sing:  
                    This Time is What You Make of It. 

So:  
Do not split the friendship poles.  
Strike forward with an even temper, 
And see with eyes unclouded. 
And never, ever pull another all-nighter.  
You’ll come to know her as we do,  
and you’ll be just fine.  
Welcome to Bryn Mawr College.  
Anassa kata.  

Good morning, everyone, 

On behalf of the faculty, it is my great honor to welcome President Wendy Cadge to our community. This is a moment of excitement, possibility, and renewal. As a college deeply rooted in the empowerment of women, we know that leadership grounded in intellectual curiosity, equity, and inclusion is the engine that drives excellence and innovation. 

President Cadge, your dedication to these values aligns perfectly with our mission. Intellectual curiosity—the courage to ask the difficult questions, to challenge convention, and to explore beyond boundaries—is at the heart of what we do. It’s how we shape not just informed citizens, but transformative leaders. 

But innovation cannot thrive without equity. As we prepare our students to shape the future, we must recognize that only by creating spaces where all voices are heard, respected, and uplifted can we achieve true progress. Inclusion must be a guiding principle—because we know that diverse perspectives fuel better ideas, and fairness leads to true opportunity. 

As faculty, we are eager to work alongside you to continue building an institution where intellectual rigor and a commitment to justice empower our students to dream big, act boldly, and lead with empathy. Together, we will push boundaries, embrace new perspectives, and foster the kind of excellence that changes the world. 

Welcome to this extraordinary journey, President Cadge. We are thrilled to begin this next chapter with you. 

Thank you. 

First, I want to thank everyone for coming here today. My name is Alexie Coleman, and I am an undergraduate student here at Bryn Mawr.  

Although I am only a sophomore, my journey here so far has taught me that part of being independent is how to collaborate or who to invite.  

In high school, I joined my Student Government where I was a Vocal Music Representative, representing a small number of music students. By asking questions and communicating with the other committees in Student Government, I started to feel I had capability of being in a role where I got to have a voice.  

Upon my college search, this interest in high school led me on a path to research about clubs related to Student Government. When I stumbled upon Bryn Mawr, I quickly learned about the Self-Government Association. This piqued my interest because lots of colleges have a student government, but not a self-government association. The sense of shared power and responsibility between students and administration, something I previously learned in Student Government caught my eye and I knew that Bryn Mawr was the place to be.  

When I first saw that SGA was at Fall Frolic I thought, “Now is my chance to finally get involved in SGA.” I was so excited and I remember signing my name on the table thinking about what positions I would be interested in running for and what catchy slogans I could use for my campaign. A week goes by and I start getting emails from SGA about the September Elections. When I looked at those emails, it just didn’t feel real. I started to doubt myself and felt that I wasn’t ready to be at a high-level position at a prestigious college. I just said to myself that maybe I’ll revisit when I’m an upperclassman.  

An unexpected twist happened: During February, my friend was on the Elections Board and wanted to run for Election Head, but didn’t want to do it alone. That’s when she invited me to collaborate with her as Co-Elections Head. My friend recognized the excellence I had and made the invitation. I was Black History Month Coordinator at the time, so It reminded me of a time I invited my other friend to collaborate with me during Black History Month. It was at a Sisterhood* gen-bod meeting in September when Joi Dallas asked, “Who wants to be Black History Month coordinators?” I looked at who I wanted to get to know better, and made the invitation saying, “We should do it together.”  

The invitation I made to Kaili that day was an example of how collaboration can be used as a relationship building tool. Planning Black History Month sparked the fuel in my engine and we had a cool glow-in-the-dark party and I had a chance to interview the Black History Month Speaker!  

I accepted the invitation to collaborate with my friend Maggie for Co-Elections Head because I knew the importance of voting and making your voice heard. By using collaboration as a relationship tool, I was able to grow by learning new things that were unknown to me, like those SGA emails.  

Thank you, President Cadge, for accepting the invitation to be Bryn Mawr’s 10th president. Even though you won’t be as close as my friend Kaili and I, myself and the undergraduate students look forward to building a relationship with you through collaboration.  

When I first came to Bryn Mawr, I was struck by this sense of curiosity and pure joy for learning, and how unique it was in that it happened as a community. My first year here, I was a TA for an upper-level lab course. The material is super fun, but what really stood out to me was how everyone interacted with one another. Every student in that class felt comfortable asking for help and making mistakes not just in front of me, but in front of and with their peers. 

In physics, women and nonbinary people make up less than a quarter of the field, and in my own subfield, it is less than 12 percent. I think it's easy to point to that course and attribute the positive learning environment to the class makeup, which was primarily people who identify as women. While that may be a factor, I believe the real cause was the intentional actions of every person there-- they valued, respected, and listened to one another. To me, that is where equity begins. Gender equity is not just about increasing representation, it's about respect. It starts in the classroom, where we can empower our peers to learn and grow by valuing their contributions and perspectives, even if they differ from our own. 

It's because of this positive learning environment that I no longer fear that scary 12% statistic. Bryn Mawr has given me confidence in my abilities and in my identity as a physicist, and I know these are things I’ll carry with me even after I graduate. As someone who has shown from day one that she values every member of our community, I could not be more excited to welcome President Wendy Cadge to Bryn Mawr. Thank you. 

It is an honor to represent Bryn Mawr College’s 524 staff members, as we celebrate the inauguration of our 10th president, Wendy Cadge. In our roles as administrators, clerical and technical personnel, and service and craft employees, we contribute hard work, dedication, and flexibility in building the "fair, open, and welcoming institutional structures, values and culture" that are the true hallmarks of Bryn Mawr College.  As we gather to honor our community, we reflect on the theme of resilience—a quality deeply embedded in Bryn Mawr’s mission. Resilience is not merely the ability to bounce back from challenges; it is the strength we cultivate through our shared values and commitments.  

The staff of Bryn Mawr College look forward to partnering with President Cadge to promote the College’s mission and make a meaningful difference in the lives of our students. In doing so, we recognize that “equity and inclusion is the engine for excellence and innovation” and that our diverse workforce not just reflects but is an integral part of this important effort. The College values its traditions and history, but our primary focus is always looking ahead, as we all work together in community and prepare our students for lives of purpose. 

Good afternoon. Thank you for this honor. I am speaking today on the phrase “lift up others” as it appears in the College’s Mission Statement.  

When I entered Bryn Mawr, I was thankfully unaware of the barriers my socioeconomic status presented. I immigrated to this country from Beirut, Lebanon at the age of seven and was raised by a single mother facing great economic hardship.  

The fact is that I needed considerable financial aid to attend Bryn Mawr. I was lifted up by many during those four years. In a lifechanging moment one semester, when my family could not meet tuition and I was faced with having to leave the school, Bryn Mawr came through with needed funds. Some of those who lifted me up were unknown to me. They were the donors who gave to the College and made my education possible.   

Because I received so much, it has been important for me to lift up others in return. My husband, Tony, and I focus our philanthropy on education because education levels the playing field to achieve equity and inclusion.  

There is another reason I care about lifting up others. Giving is as rewarding as receiving. This lesson was reinforced as I faced the culmination of ten years of service to the Board last spring. In the end, it was important to me that our president, Kim Cassidy, knew how much I supported her. I thought that if I had made it better for Kim or for anyone else on the Board, I could leave at peace with my accomplishments. 

Going back to my time at Bryn Mawr, there was a song we sang at Step Sings called Bread and Roses. While I did not fully grasp the lyrics at that time, I sensed through the refrain “As we come marching, marching” that as women, we fall in place in the procession, behind women who came before us and in front of those who will come after us. On Step Sing nights, when the song ended, we raised our lanterns into the night sky in a moment of silence, in recognition of what was not named but understood. If I can articulate it now, it would be “It is different here than in the rest of the world. We should make the world more like it is here.” Lifting up others is ingrained in who we are as Mawrters. It is part of our tradition.  

Wendy, you are a natural leader. We are thrilled you have joined us to carry on the tradition. We look forward to lifting you up, as you lift up others.  

Congratulations, Bryn Mawr College, on your new president, Wendy Cadge! And congratulations, Wendy! As president of Haverford College, I bring greetings and joyous hurrahs from the Haverford Board of Managers, Senior Staff, faculty, students, staff, and alums on this wonderful occasion. Wendy and Bryn Mawr, I am thrilled to be a partner to you in our shared commitment to the Bi-Co. Haverford would not be the same Haverford without Bryn Mawr.  

In the spirit of true Bi-Co cooperation on this glorious day, I note that this is an historic occasion in an unusual way. Before Wendy and me there were two Kims as presidents of Bryn Mawr and Haverford, Kim Cassidy and Kim Benston. And now, isn’t it lovely that Bryn Mawr has taken that forward beyond anyone’s imagination to have …. two Wendy’s??? Really? Now, neither Kim nor Wendy are common names. Who could have predicted that?! I take it as a true sign of our continued Bi-Co alignment. 

More seriously, the gifts of the Bi-Co mean that at Haverford, we celebrate Bryn Mawr College every day. And today, on a day of celebration unlike any other, we celebrate all that Wendy Cadge brings to leading Bryn Mawr.   

Wendy, like Bryn Mawr, is strong, smart, and wise. She brings optimism, a wide range of talents, and a can-do attitude to all she encounters. She is empathetic and caring. She is discerning and clear-thinking. She is investing in Bryn Mawr’s present and future through her conversations and relationships with all of you. And in turn, you, through the reciprocity you will bring to those conversations and relationships, are likewise investing in Wendy and Bryn Mawr’s futures.  

Wendy Cadge’s vision and talents mirror the enduring brilliance and spirit of this remarkable institution. Brava, Wendy, and Brava, Bryn Mawr! 

Good afternoon!

I’m delighted to be part of this historic day for Bryn Mawr College and this extraordinary milestone in the life of a Swarthmore alum and my distinguished colleague, President Wendy Cadge. Bryn Mawr’s welcoming environment, love of learning, and strong sense of community are on full display this weekend — which is fitting for a celebration of a new president who embodies these very characteristics.

Wendy, by now, we all know that you are a child of DelCo (for our out-of-town guests — that’s short for Delaware County, Pennsylvania), so your arrival at Bryn Mawr is a bit of a homecoming — sort of. You will find that some things have changed about the area; Wawa serves pizza now. But other things have remained the same; fall is still the most beautiful time to wander among the campus trees…and the most painful time to root for the Phillies.  

Your undergraduate home at Swarthmore has preserved a number of the traditions we share with Bryn Mawr. I was delighted to read your recent interview in the Bi-Co Newspaper about the ways that the Quaker values you learned at Swarthmore continue to inform your approach to leadership — the practices of engaging in difficult conversations while speaking plainly, making room for all viewpoints, and listening with an open mind and heart.

Your peers and contemporaries have praised you for the ways in which you’ve carried these values forward. Haverford alumna, former Swarthmore provost, and current Smith College President Sarah Willie-LeBreton — who is, like Wendy, a sociologist — recently remarked that you bring “an almost pastoral approach to [your] ability to listen deeply …” And that you, “… respond with care when people are in pain, respond with pragmatism when they are in confusion, and celebrate with them when they are experiencing joy.” At a time when colleges and universities across the country are confronting a variety of complex challenges, your experience will serve you — and the entire Bryn Mawr community — immensely well.  

Swarthmore, like Bryn Mawr, has also maintained an unwavering, unapologetic belief in the power of the liberal arts, even amid misguided criticisms and questioning of the value of a liberal arts education. The Tri-College consortium's enduring partnership has expanded avenues of learning for our students and enriched their academic experience. 

We are living in a world that has never been more connected, yet is increasingly divided — a world in which challenges and opportunities develop more rapidly and with less predictability. Success in navigating today’s global society lies at the intersection of academic fields and the ability to pair intellectual rigor and creative exploration with a pursuit of the common good. In other words, success lies with the liberal arts. I look forward to finding new ways to work together and demonstrate the value of the liberal arts to the communities and world around us. To borrow from the theme of the day, let’s “get out the light.”  

As future Bryn Mawr students graduate into this world, I am confident that they will be better prepared as intellectuals and as humans, thanks to President Cadge’s leadership and principled values.  

Wendy, the Bryn Mawr community is fortunate to have you. Please know that I am here to partner with you, to cheer you on, and to help celebrate your many future accomplishments as you open this next chapter in Bryn Mawr's history.  

Good day. My name is Fred Wherry and I am the vice-dean for diversity and inclusion in the Office of the Dean of Faculty at Princeton University, where I am also the Townsend Martin, Class of 1917 Professor of Sociology. On behalf of the University, it is my honor and joy to congratulate Wendy Cadge on her inauguration as the 10th president of Bryn Mawr College. Wendy was my colleague in the Sociology PhD program at Princeton, so it is with great delight that we witness her ascend to the head of this remarkable institution. 

Bryn Mawr and Princeton share a commitment to cultivating bold learners, who are unafraid to ask troubling questions, even about matters  that appear, at first glance, to have been settled long ago. What was is not what will always be. And students engaged in a liberal arts education understand how to imagine the possible and how to push it into being. They also recognize the value of humility, of acknowledging what we don’t know, and of working with others, regardless of where they come from or what viewpoints they hold, in a shared pursuit of truth. 

Increasingly, colleges and universities are depicted as places generating useless knowledge or practicing highly political indoctrination. It would seem that the only knowledge worth having is that which will yield an immediate result with benefits obvious to anyone who looks. And there are those who argue that the only knowledge that is legitimate lies outside of politics, walled off in a place of purity. Yet our classrooms are intricately linked to the broader world we inhabit. Therefore, the only wall we need to build is a bulwark against falsehoods. 

Wendy understands what we defend when we insist on the importance of a liberal arts education. It is not just an intimate marketplace of ideas in the ways that marketplaces typically work because some of our biggest advances in science and in the arts require capital that is patient and investigations that have had the time and space for failure and for non-results.  Some knowledge remains valuable simply by being preserved. Some findings are revelatory by virtue of being shared. On that which is preserved and shared, new ideas are built. 

There are contributors to knowledge who are not always recognized as such. Their work is overlooked and their experiences are not reflected in the priorities of well-meaning innovators. That is why some of the very beneficiaries of our research findings do not see themselves as connected in any way to the work of research. This is one of the real challenges we all face across the higher education ecosystem, and it means that we are called not only to discover and to inspire but also to connect.  

Wendy is a connector as much as she is a gifted scholar, an inspiring visionary, and principled leader. As a scholar of the sociology of religion, she has investigated how our morals, religious beliefs, and traditions profoundly shape how we connect and how we interpret the material conditions we encounter. In her academic and administrative work, she is quick to ask who is not in the room, whose experiences are not reflected in our discoveries and why. She does this in ways that exemplify why a liberal arts education is so essential for the challenges we confront and for the opportunities we must forge, together. 

Bryn Mawr knew what it was doing when it selected Wendy Cadge to lead this incredible place as its 10th president. Congratulations, Wendy, and best wishes. 

Greetings from Brandeis University where, for the last eighteen years our students, alumni, and faculty have been the beneficiaries of Wendy Cadge’s ground-breaking scholarship, extraordinary teaching, and dedicated service as a highly accomplished member of our Department of Sociology and Department of Women’s, Gender, and Sexuality Studies and, for the last three years, as Dean of the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences. But Dr. Cadge’s impact was also felt well beyond our campus in Waltham, MA, touching a whole array of people and organizations through her essential community-engaged research on chaplaincies and religious leadership outside the traditional confines of church, synagogue, temple, or mosque.  

In my capacity as Brandeis Dean of Arts and Sciences and on behalf of our President, Provost, and senior leadership, it is my great pleasure and honor to offer our institutional congratulations, along with my own personal well wishes, to President Cadge as she embarks this next—and so well-deserved—step in her auspicious career. 

Bryn Mawr is fortunate to have someone as thoughtful, committed, and caring as Wendy at the helm. I am excited to see how your institution continues to flourish under her leadership. Onward and upward! 

It is such a pleasure to visit Bryn Mawr College on this special occasion to celebrate the inauguration of Wendy Cadge as your tenth president.  

Bryn Mawr feels like home. I still remember when I first visited Mount Holyoke College. The fresh air, the rolling hills in the distance, and all the greenery blending with the historic buildings. I also remember a dynamic professor opening a class visit with a thought-provoking question and the debate that ensued - the students’ engaging each other’s diverse perspectives. As a high school student who would become the first in her family to graduate from high school, college, and law school, I took none of this for granted. Mount Holyoke felt like a sanctuary, as does Bryn Mawr today—an oasis of learning. Open. Inspiring. Full of Possibility. 

On this occasion, it’s fitting to reflect on the role of a women’s college in creating sanctuaries. 

Bryn Mawr and Mount Holyoke were both founded at a time when the education of women was not simply a rarity but an act of defiance against the constraints of the era. Mount Holyoke, the first of the Seven Sisters, was founded in 1837 by Mary Lyon, a visionary who believed that women deserved an education equal to men’s. In 1885, Bryn Mawr followed, embodying the same bold commitment to academic rigor and intellectual freedom. 

Both institutions share this pioneering spirit—a determination to break down barriers, to offer opportunities where there were none, and to educate women who would go on to change the world. Beyond simply an education, they demanded the highest standards of scholarship and set benchmarks that have inspired generations of women to reach beyond what was thought possible. 

Bryn Mawr and Mount Holyoke College as sanctuaries cultivate authentic leadership. They teach us that leadership is not just about authority or power; it is about influence, vision, and the ability to inspire others. We learn that leaders are those who understand the importance of empathy, compassion, and resilience. And that they are the ones who, having found their own sanctuary, are empowered to create safe spaces for others. 

Consider the leaders who have shaped history—those women who stood up in times of adversity, who rallied communities, and who dared to challenge the status quo. Many of them found their strength in sanctuaries. They sought refuge in their values, beliefs, and the support of their communities. They understood that leadership is not a solitary journey but a collective endeavor that thrives in environments of trust and understanding. 

In our contemporary society, the importance of sanctuaries is underscored by the challenges we face: decreasing economic mobility, political crises, and a pervasive sense of disconnection. In times of turmoil, the need for a sanctuary becomes urgent. This is why Wendy’s presidency is so important.  

I first met Wendy Cadge when she invited me to join Brandeis University to develop and teach a course in the business school on leadership and diversity. Wendy valued my corporate experience as well as my commitment to advancing women in the workplace. My belief, then and now, is that a focus on diversity and inclusion is fundamentally a focus on value creation.  When we speak of creating a sanctuary for students and employees, we are talking about fostering an environment where talent can thrive and investments in talent yield intellectual, financial, and social returns. Without building the kind of trust that fuels collaboration, innovation and problem-solving, we cannot improve our organizations and our society.  

As we celebrate Wendy Cadge’s inauguration today, we are reminded that the work of these institutions is far from complete. The challenges of the 21st century require leadership that is both bold and compassionate, as all who know Wendy would describe her, and leadership that cultivates future leaders.   

Wendy, I have every confidence that under your tenure, Bryn Mawr will continue to build upon the proud legacies of these two institutions and remain a beacon of women’s education, empowerment, and leadership for years to come. 

Today we gather in gratitude for this place and in celebration of this new chapter in its history.  This is an institution that changes the lives of those who work and study here and helps its students shape futures of promise when they leave.  So I am honored to have been asked to share this day with all of you. 

I am standing here today because I first met Wendy Cadge in 1999 when she was a graduate student, and I was an assistant professor at Penn (although I was almost two decades her senior due to my own mid-life shift into academia).   We overlapped in a weekly colloquium at the Center for the Study of Religion at Princeton while Wendy was being trained in sociology.  I was a post-doctoral fellow, an historian of 20th African American politics and culture, but with no training in religion, a fact that had not stopped my urge to write a book on the subject.   

So, despite our differences, we met on the equal ground that classrooms create – joined simply as students as we read, listened to, and critiqued new work.  Favorable first impressions do matter and my impressions of her remain intact and true:  really smart and clear-headed, but also kind and generous; direct but not rude or rigid in her thinking, with no impulse to posture or show off; a gifted writer but also a very good listener with an urge toward common ground, commonsense, practicality, and next steps.   

We then went our separate ways with an occasional sighting at an event or a conference, but nothing sustained.   

Still, like many chance encounters on campuses, that one shaped both of our futures – in my case, later yielding a book on the history of debates about the political role of black churches.  And for her, that time launched her career as an exceptional scholar of religion with that rare combination of capacious intellectual curiosity and panoramic conceptual imagination, anchored by honoring people’s lived experiences – and always, always linking her piercing questions to pressing contemporary matters.   

When one reads her prolific body of scholarship, all those attributes are on full display.  It’s there in her first book, a groundbreaking work on the history of Theravada Buddhism in America, a topic she arrived at while on a Fulbright in Sri Lanka.  Based in part on deep ethnographic research here in Philadelphia, that work asks, as she herself put it, “how religions or ideas travel and how they are constructed and understood by people in new locations.”   Just as in my first impression, there it was again – the habits of mind I just described:  concision and clarity of purpose in a book of beautifully rendered prose about immigration and religion, but ultimately also about how people process trauma, loss, and relocation, and work toward community re-constitution. 

How we cope with crisis remained a central concern in her research and writing, made plainer when her interests shifted to the area of study that brought us back together two decades after our first meeting in 1999.  And that work – in several new books and dozens of articles - was on the evolving role of chaplains and spiritual caregivers, initially in health care settings – the area most familiar to us, but also later in many different kinds of institutional settings – in prisons, colleges and universities, the military, corporate workplaces, even airports and on ships and across a rich diversity of religious and spiritual beliefs and practices.   

At the heart of her research too was an empathetic recognition of the emotional and psychic costs of that work to spiritual caregivers.  Wendy’s founding in 2018 of the Chaplaincy Lab at Brandeis was her attempt to do something to meet that need.  That innovative project twinned much needed research with the building of networks of care, support, and community among over 15,000 chaplains and spiritual caregivers.   

The covid-19 crisis in 2020 had made more visible the often-overlooked work of spiritual care in health care and elsewhere as institutions closed their doors to family and visitors.  So it was in the middle of the pandemic – almost exactly four years ago today – that Wendy emailed to invite me to do some historical research into the roles of black chaplains and spiritual caregivers.  I was exhausted and had just finished a first draft of a book, but she pulled me in for a variety of reasons, not least the clarity of purpose that she and her team had built into that work.   

As a sociologist, she works in the world of now, searching to apply research to contemporary problems; as a historian, like most humanists, I like to wallow in the past, to uncover or rediscover texts and artifacts.  But this project recognized the need for both with equal urgency and so I said yes – to what remains one of the most gratifying experiences in my academic life. 

For me, reconnecting after so long only reaffirmed my first impressions of her as a scholar, but also allowed me to see the evolution of her extraordinary gifts as a quietly effective, ambitious, and visionary leader.  It also quickly became clear to me that she also had the administrative experience and temperament and drive to use those skills to do a great amount of good in larger venues.  Her humility and her modesty are not false, so it took some persuading over time as she began to explore other opportunities for her brand of collaborative leadership – including in due time the one that now brings us here today.  

In many ways, our friendship mirrors that of many among and across generations of women who mentor one another as we wrestle with the questions of purpose and meaning in our lives and in our commitments.  And then, when necessary, we push and then protect each other as we venture into new more challenging territory.   

I do not need to explain that at a place like Bryn Mawr, where women are trained to lead, deeply bonded to one another in common cause to do some good beyond the boundaries of time and space on this campus.  

So thank you for bringing Wendy home to Philadelphia which now permits me to share not just this beautiful day with you, but also the joys of new friendships with her family, especially Deborah, Risa, and Nate. 

I am genuinely honored to welcome President Wendy Cadge, as well as her wife, Deborah Elliott, and her children, Risa Elliott-Cadge and Nate Elliott-Cadge here to the Bryn Mawr community. 

Bryn Mawr is an amazing, challenging place.  It was founded on a progressive vision of women pursuing the kind of education only available to men.  It was also founded on exclusions of race and class and wealth, welcoming only specific kinds of women into its fold.   

These two statements are true, both at once.  And today, we welcome a leader who is not only willing to look at both, but one who understands that one requires the other.  There is no future without the past, and there is no reckoning with that past without a deliberate and brave vision of what our future can look like.   

I say this as someone who studies the distant past. My discipline, medieval studies, was created at the same moment England and France were powering up their imperialist aims around the globe.  Medieval studies was designed to create a partnership between scholarly inquiry and colonial power by finding in the past a “Europe” that was presumed culturally superior to Africa, Asia, and the Americas.   

I did not know this disciplinary history when I took my first medieval literature class. I just loved it: the language, the stories, the deeply weird and beautiful poetry.  And I love sharing that love that remains with me with my brilliant, curious students.  So how to maintain this love and acknowledge this field’s exclusionary origins?  Together, my students and I must bear witness to the voices that have been muted, to shine a light into the cracks of my field’s history.  It can be difficult, truth be told.  But hope for my field’s future can only be had through honest acknowledgment and genuine love, both at once. 

When I first met President Cadge, I felt a frisson of energy.  Here was someone who understood that we must look honestly at our histories if we are to work towards realizing what this place can and should be.  Here was someone unafraid to think about our most difficult challenges. President Cadge brings a wide-eyed optimism about the power of the liberal arts as well as a clear-eyed practicality about their pursuit.  Optimism and pragmatism, both at once. 

President Cadge carries both with ease and good humor, both at once, in ways that have already gathered and renewed us.  

We are all so, so thrilled you’re here.  Welcome.  

You may recall how and when you encountered Bryn Mawr for the first time. Or, perhaps you recall the moment you understood Bryn Mawr to be a special place, in its distinctiveness, its wonder, and its complexity. At seventeen, I marveled at the campus, the feeling of community, and the prospect of getting my very own lantern. At nineteen, I witnessed how varied the “Bryn Mawr experience” was among fellow Mawrters. At twenty-one, I didn’t run, but gingerly stepped, into the “real world,” and carried Bryn Mawr with me as I went. Eleven years later, I returned.

As idyllic as this sounds, the underlying reality is sobering. Bryn Mawr was not built for me, the Academy was not built for me, and the mathematical world was not built for me.  Regardless of context, to navigate historically exclusionary spaces is to experience trauma cloaked in a perception of privilege. To thrive in historically exclusionary spaces requires fortitude and sacrifice. To transform historically exclusionary spaces requires genuine commitment and vision.  

What does it mean to have vision? The mathematician in me likes definitions, so I looked it up. According to Merriam-Webster, vision is “the special sense by which the qualities of an object constituting its appearance are perceived.” According to Oxford, vision is “the ability to think about or plan the future with imagination or wisdom.” So, vision comprises seeing the reality of Bryn Mawr today as well as the promise of Bryn Mawr tomorrow. Given enough time, energy, resources, hard work, and a fearless leader, we can realize a vision of Bryn Mawr that acknowledges its past, analyzes its present, and innovates its future.  

Which brings me to why we are all here today. When I first met President Cadge in person, it was under a shroud of secrecy in an undisclosed location that I have sworn never to reveal. During that very animated conversation, I observed someone who was eager to understand the multifaceted nature of Bryn Mawr and someone who could and would simultaneously see, hear, value, question, reflect, engage, and ignite imagination. Simply put, I witnessed vision at work.

But, don’t just take my word for it. Let’s go to the source. I have selected a few soundbites from President Cadge since being named president and have compiled them completely out of context, as one does.

I call these Wendy’s Words of Wisdom (or W3 for all of you quantitative folks). 

• “Bryn Mawr is a remarkable place…”
• “[W]hat led me here…”: “questions about class and difference and how to engage across difference, seen and unseen.”
• “We have to see each of us and work collaboratively to ensure that everyone in our community is named, seen, and valued.”
• “Welcome to the magic we make together.”
• “There will be a bouncy house.”

It is my honor and privilege to introduce Bryn Mawr’s 10th president, Wendy Cadge. 

Good afternoon and welcome.  

Today is an unusual day. It is a day that has happened only nine times in the 139 years since the College was founded. For the math oriented among us that is, on average, once every 14 years.  

I am beyond honored to be on the stage today with nearly half of Bryn Mawr College’s presidents – Pat McPherson, Jane McAullife, Kim Cassidy and now me. When I turned ten and  - many years later - when each of my children turned ten, my Dad greeted us on our birthday mornings by calling us “double-digits.” Never did I imagine I would have the honor of being Bryn Mawr College’s first double-digit president. 

We are here today to celebrate Bryn Mawr College. 

We are here for the light. 

That light has a past. It has a present. And it has a future we are imagining together.  

I want to begin by honoring and naming all who are here to see and celebrate that light:   

• First, my predecessors in this role – will the four former presidents please raise their hands? 
• Now, the reason we are all here - current students 
• Current and former faculty 
• Current and former Members of the Board of Trustees 
• Current and former staff 
• Alumni  
• Parents and friends including our neighbors and members of the local community 
• Representatives of our peer institutions in higher education including several current presidents 

I want to also acknowledge those members of the College community whose stories have not always been told. The College, under the direction of my remarkable predecessor Kim Cassidy, and with a lot of work by students and faculty, has been learning and sharing these stories. This is the history of African-American women and men who worked as maids and porters for earlier generations of mostly white students. It is the history of the earliest students who came from Asia to study here. It is the stories of all who are part of the Who Built Bryn Mawr Project, an ongoing effort that gives us the opportunity to deepen and transform how the Bryn Mawr community understands the College’s history.  

Who Built Bryn Mawr is, in my view, a national model for how to engage higher education communities in the excavation and crafting of layered narratives about the past and its living legacies. I encourage you today or in the future to take the Black at Bryn Mawr tour to learn more about some of these untold stories. 

The College will continue to learn about and honor these stories, to bring these members into the light, when we dedicate Nekisha Durrett’s monument “Don't Forget to Remember (Me)” in April as part of the Art Remediating College Histories Project or ARCH. Plan now to join us.  

I also want to personally acknowledge and thank those who made it possible for me to be here today, to join the Bryn Mawr College community and its light.  

• My wife Deborah and our children Nate and Risa  
• My parents, sisters and their families 
• My five grandmothers including 
• Phyllis Holcomb Bates Cadge Lyon born in 1920 
• Elizabeth Downing Hipple Griffith Hemminger born in 1926  
• I want to thank my friends here and watching from many corners of the globe including my former colleagues, now friends, from Brandeis University many of whom made the trip here. Thank you. 
• I want to recognize my teachers from Springfield School District just a few miles away. I was raised in Delaware County and am thankful for several of my teachers who are with us today (and one who was recently hospitalized). I’m just as grateful for my teachers at Swarthmore College who are here and watching from afar, including my first-year adviser and my senior thesis adviser who is watching from Hungary. It is these people who led me to other teachers in Sri Lanka, in graduate school, and as a postdoctoral fellow and young faculty member.  

Never – and I mean never – would I be standing here, in the light, without each of your love and support.

Today is a day for bringing communities together. To the chair and members of the Board of Trustees, distinguished faculty, curious students, thoughtful and engaged staff, amazing alumnae including more than twenty groups gathered for watch parties in San Francisco, Houston, Grinnell Iowa, Paris and more; thank you for welcoming me here today and for welcoming me and my family (including the pugs and the cats and the frog). We are honored to be on this adventure alongside each of you. 

The Light 

I officially joined this community almost four months ago, and I have been learning – constantly. I have a lot of questions – as many of you know – and part of my learning is trying to figure out what the most important questions are to be asking about the College at this point in its history- and in the social and political contexts in which we find ourselves.  

I think about these questions as I walk the campus, sit with many of you in dining halls and meetings, work out on the elliptical machines in the Schwartz Fitness Center, attend lectures and campus events, and overhear conversations on campus pathways. I listen and watch and think. Many think the answers to questions are the most important parts. I’m not so sure. So much of what the liberal arts teaches us is how to ask the right questions – how to lead with questions and insist that questions be taken seriously.  

So why are we here? Not existentially - though I am a sociologist of religion and we can talk about that later if you want. But why are we here on a Saturday afternoon dressed up in funny outfits when we could be in so many other places? Why were, and are and will people be drawn to Bryn Mawr College as a place to learn and play, to work and build lifelong communities? What makes Bryn Mawr distinctive and how can we ensure that distinctiveness makes a significant, ongoing impact in the world? What does it look like to fulfill the College’s mission, today in 2024, and to steward the remarkable resources we have been given by the past and loaned by the future to enable those who come after us to do the same? These, I think, are the most important questions. The ones I have been thinking about over the last four months.  

Well-meaning people like to ask me some version of the question, “What are you going to do at Bryn Mawr College?” My answer, “I am going to do very little and we, I hope, are going to do much.” 

I – in the singular – can’t answer these questions. My job is to help us answer them together as we imagine and build the college’s next chapter.  

We are here because of Bryn Mawr’s mission statement, which is central to its next chapter. It led me to apply for this job and is a central part of why I accepted it when friends and colleagues, especially in this political climate, thought I must be a little nuts to even consider it. The college’s values of intellectual curiosity, independence, gender equity, resilience, and the uplift of others are my personal values too, as is the deep commitment in practice – not just words and symbols – to engage equity and inclusion as engines for excellence and innovation. 

We are here because of the college’s symbols and traditions, also part of its next chapter. The owls, our new mascot Olympia – Olly for short, Athena, the school colors, the lantern. Classic traditions like Parade Night, Lantern Night and May Day; lesser-known ones like the bra tree, the friendship poles, and “Done is Good” boards at finals. 

We are here because of what I believe is the college’s core, its DNA, out of which the next chapter grows. It isn’t about the owls or the presidents (older or newer) or even about the lanterns. Bryn Mawr College is very clear about what is central for us; the light. Across generations, we embody the pursuit of knowledge and the power of ideas to light and change the world. 

This thirst for knowledge, this spark of curiosity, this passion for learning, oozes from every pore of the institution and community and is symbolized by the lantern. It is about what happens in English House, Park, Dalton, Tri-Co Philly, the libraries, and so many other spaces of teaching, learning, and playing. The first-year students I met and ate ice cream with on the lawn of the president’s house in August came to Bryn Mawr for this light, – some of them leaving their home countries for the very first time. Students, both graduate and undergraduate, complete their studies having learned to learn which – at least from the alums I have met so far –continues over their lifetimes. [One of them was even on Jeopardy last week!] 

I spoke in my convocation address about the magic that happens at the start of each semester. That same magic happens as alums get to know one another and see the Bryn Mawr light in each other. I am yet to be in a gathering of Mawrters, of any generation, where asking about a book does not open the conversation.  

This metaphor of light as Bryn Mawr’s core commitment to learning and knowledge allows us to look at the lantern in new ways. The lantern is the container for the light – that which houses it, carries it, shapes it, and makes it accessible. The lantern represents the College as an institution, shaping how the light emerges and projects out into the world. I believe that our work together is to make that lantern as effective as it can be to support, amplify, engage and share the light. How do we enable that light to burn the brightest and have the most significant impact now and for future generations? 

Generations 

On days like today, we especially honor and recognize our predecessors who first harnessed this light for women – who literally turned on the lights at Bryn Mawr College. Our Quaker forebearers deeply valued education, not just for individuals but in institutions dedicated to that purpose. From the beginning, the College was designed to provide access not just to higher education, but to a truly world-class education, rivaling the very best men’s institutions of the time. That’s why we are unique among our liberal arts college peers in our longstanding commitment to graduate education, today through the Graduate School of Social Work and Social Research, Graduate School of Arts and Sciences, and Postbaccalaureate Premedical Program. It’s why we were the first women’s college in the United States to offer doctoral degrees and why our scope has long been global.  

Today the light burns brightly as our faculty and students learn and grow together. I see this in classrooms and in the fans at sporting events (many toting big textbooks to read at half time). I see it in the libraries and study carrels, and the summer work students and faculty did together and reported on at a campus-wide coffee in September. The external recognition is there in the faculty who receive Fulbright grants and funds from the National Science Foundation, National Institutes of Health and other sources and published their work in many books and articles. It is in the care our staff in campus safety, the library, buildings & grounds, the Dean’s Office, the health and counseling centers, and so many other offices across campus offer for our students, not just as scholars but as whole people.  

The lanterns across the stage today belonged to undergraduates from many generations at the College. You can see they have changed. The College – like the lanterns all new undergraduates receive– is always changing because the students are always changing. Faculty, staff, and alumni age. Students never do. They graduate and new (younger) students arrive each fall with that spark of light, that thirst for knowledge, that deep zeal for learning. 

As we look to the next chapter, the light will remain core and the container may change. All of the lanterns across the stage, for example, require a separate light source - a match and a candle or a battery powered candle. In talking with faculty and staff and looking at the world today, I think it is time for a solar powered lantern, one with a more environmentally sustainable power source.  

It is too early for me to announce major campus initiatives – we are coming to them together. I can share that whatever they are – we will work through them sustainably. I am committed to accelerating the College’s sustainability work over the next five years. To help catalyze Bryn Mawr’s work to date, we will be increasing resources to support faculty, staff and students working on these issues and create a new position in 2025 that is 100% focused on sustainability at the college and in our local communities. 

Our Adventure 

I stand here today with the College community – past, present, and future - with deep and abiding gratitude: 

• I am grateful for a community that – through our shared resources - enables 83% of our students to receive some form of financial aid, meeting 100% of demonstrated need, 
• I am grateful for an institution that knows deep in its bones that education remains the surest tool for social mobility.  
• I am grateful for an institution that doesn’t just talk the talk, but walks the walk on bringing into the light difficult and previously overlooked parts of our history  
• I am grateful for an institution building new partnerships with area community colleges  - including a pilot on campus-program for current community college students next summer that will further introduce students to the benefits of a liberal arts education, and maybe eventually a bachelor’s degree from Bryn Mawr. 
• I am grateful for graduate schools with seven PhD programs in addition to masters degrees in social work, and an amazing post baccalaureate program in which 95% of students are admitted to medical school. As a former Graduate Dean, this warms my heart. 
• I am grateful for so many generations and intellectual communities of women: those who are cisgender, transgender, and those who do not navigate within the gender binary 

I experience Bryn Mawr as a place that is more than the sum of its parts. It is a beacon that not only educates but demonstrates; that changes individual lives and offers a collective vision of the difference we can make when we work together. The world needs beacons and our collective light is a source of hope for all.  Our job together is to strengthen, amplify, and lift the light higher so it shines – maybe like a lighthouse - broadly and brightly, so the value of women’s colleges and the mission of Bryn Mawr is impossible for the world to miss.  I want our lighthouse to have mirrors and disco balls to catch and spread the light, in all its fabulous rainbows.  

The Spark 

Ok, you might be thinking, enough about this light. Or you might be wondering – where does the spark that makes this light possible come from? That, I believe, is a deeply personal question, with which many of us struggle.  

For me, that spark is love – love of knowledge, love of learning, love of one another, and the possibilities in loving community – the ways I have seen groups be more than the sum of their parts.  

When I was fifteen, the new band director at Springfield High School (who is here with us today), selected me as a sophomore to lead the marching band in my junior and senior years (which just wasn’t done). He then sent me to summer drum major camp at West Chester University – which is a story for another day as are the boots I wore when trying to look confident walking down the 50-yard line in front of the band twirling a mace at half-time.  

Our band had not been trained in conventional marching techniques. It wasn’t the new director or me - newly graduated from summer drum major camp - who taught them. It was drummers and flute players, trumpet players and members of the color guard working in small peer groups with discipline, laughter, and a lot of love and patience.  All it takes is a team – or a marching band – to show how a group can be more than the sum of its parts. 

I am here today because I believe love is the strongest force in the universe. It is the glue that turns a marching band that doesn’t really know how to march into something I am talking to you about thirty years later. 

As my colleagues, now friends at the Fetzer Institute, say in their mission statement, “we believe in the possibility of a loving world: a world where we understand we are all part of one human family and know our lives have purpose. In the world we seek, everyone is committed to courageous compassion and bold love—powerful forces for good in the face of fear, anger, division, and despair.” 

I am here because of a student I met on campus at Hillel a few weeks ago who told me, “When you meet anger with anger, the result is anger. And when you meet anger with love something radical can happen.” Yes. 

I took three honors seminars in college titled “Love and Religion,” “Religious Belief and Moral Action,” and “Liberation Theology.” My classmates and I read the Song of Songs and other sacred texts, and learned from Dorothy Day, Martin Luther King Jr., Gustavo Gutierrez, Thich Naht Hanh, and so many others who dedicated themselves to the hard and radical work of love. That is my personal spark. 

Toni Morrison wrote about the importance of institutionalizing this radical work.  “Inviting compassion into the bloodstream of an institution’s agenda or a scholar’s purpose is more than productive, more than civilizing, more than ethical, more than humane;” she wrote, “it’s humanizing.” 

To conclude: 

I am here because it takes all of us - staff, faculty, Board members, alums, donors, former presidents, neighbors and friends. We believe in the light and, I believe, together will create the solar lanterns that will illuminate the college’s next chapter, will transform lives, and will continue to change the world.  

I am here for all of you, and I’m grateful to each of you for being here today – and every day- for each other.  

I am here and grateful for friends and colleagues on the stage, watching from afar on their laptops, and in the audience who are here to support me personally.  

I am here and grateful for the entire Bryn Mawr College community, in whose legacy we stand and whose next chapter we are writing collectively.  

I am here and grateful for the light…for when we bring our lights together, we are - and will continue to be dazzling.   

What do you do when a hope becomes a reality? You celebrate! Today, we bridge forward into a new era of Bryn Mawr College and welcome our 10th President, Wendy Cadge.  

I would like to challenge us to think about what happens when a hope does not bear fruit. To pour countless hours into a critical application, a dream job, a protest, or to be met with a response that you had not hoped for? What do you do when barriers make your hopes seem unattainable? 

At Bryn Mawr, we lean into our community, whether it be coming together in celebration or solidarity, or in the smaller settings of support such as sharing meals together. My community was my Posse, the geology department and the Enid Cook Center, because in the moments where I felt like I did not belong, they always uplifted me. At Bryn Mawr, our communities instill the drive to keep moving forward. 

So, let us dream together in this new chapter of Bryn Mawr. Let us dream of a continuing equitable institution, of an institution that will always break barriers so that all are welcomed in the highest social and academic standards.  

And, if you feel hopeless about where we stand as an institution, let’s do something about it! Change does not happen if we only talk within separate bodies; it happens when we take our respective strengths and bridge our communities together, as students, staff, faculty, alumni, and the board of trustees, with our new president as our leader. At Bryn Mawr, to move forward means to build on the work of generations past. So, let us remember those who came before us and the communities who came before us, as we look towards a brighter future.  

It is an honor and privilege to be here to represent Bryn Mawr’s Alumnae Association and its 25,000 undergraduate, graduate, and post bac alumnae.  Alums who, like me, carry their student experience with them as we make joyful impact across the world. Our reputation precedes us. We are fiercely independent thinkers, proud intellectuals, and full of opinions. Each Mawrter has their individual story to tell about their unique journey to, through, and after Bryn Mawr. However, when you gather us together, our collective and common bonds shine, and you find an alumnae community that endeavors to lift each other up. This alumnae community is linked from generation to generation by a thread of unique traditions, esteemed faculty, magic cookie bars, and beloved friendships that stand the test of time. It is no wonder that we have nearly 1,000 active and engaged alumnae leadership volunteers who prioritize giving back to Bryn Mawr. And many of these alums are here today, representing their class and graduate schools. In addition, we have over 70 Regional Clubs across the globe that are hubs and connectors for our expansive Bryn Mawr network. They are also proudly celebrating with us today.  
  
The inauguration of a new president is a welcome opportunity for the entire Bryn Mawr family to celebrate a new chapter in our alma mater’s history.  We are so lucky that president McPherson, president McAuliffe, and president Cassidy are here to celebrate with us today.  Thank you for taking such good care of our beloved Bryn Mawr.  We love you. 

President Cadge, last spring you received a lantern as part of your welcome to Bryn Mawr. In just a few short months, you have already used it to shine a light on all that is possible here at the College.  Thank you for seeing our excellence and wanting to amplify it across the world. I am confident that we alumnae will both raise our voices to be heard, and listen to one another as we help you build an ever more equitable and supportive Bryn Mawr community. And I am ready and excited to move forward with you in this important work.  

As you all know, Mawrters have a not-so-quiet traditional toast that appears whenever and wherever good is happening.  Today, we turn to our current student leaders, making their way to the stage now, to show us how it is done.