Armed with some advice from their classmates, a favorite teacher and a little boy who loves a stuffed tiger, the Class of 2012 from The Derryfield School was set loose upon the world Saturday.

Alexander Michaud welcomed his classmates and their guests with a humor-laced call for them to become not the “masters of the universe” the private school has prepared them to be. Rather, Michaud, who will attend Yale University, suggested they end up “masters of ourselves … unafraid to tell the world what we want and why we want it.”

“And the world will look favorably on us for it, and we will find success and happiness there.”

Valedictorian Cameron M. Campbell, who is heading to Stanford, shared some life lessons from the comic strip “Calvin and Hobbes.” He urged his classmates to “keep the child within each of us alive.”

He warned of the risk of becoming so fixated on the conventional definitions of success “that we forget what it means to simply experience life, without goals, without conventions, without parameters.”

And he likened commencement to Calvin heading out with a toboggan and his tiger friend after the first snow of the season: “It's a magical world, Hobbes, ol' buddy … Let's go exploring!”

Math teacher Steve Mathes, the seniors' choice to give the commencement address, reminded them they would never again be together like this. So he told them to take in all the friends and family gathered in the auditorium.

“You can find beauty, freedom and friendship, in yourself here and now, from knowing what and who you love,” he said.

But he advised them: “Freedom and friendship both involve work, more work than merely keeping up with a bunch of lame tweets, or even lamer Facebook messages and updates. Support, love and care come from actual face time, with actual, living faces.”

Mathes choked up as he told them one final time: “Good luck. Have a good life.”

In her farewell address, Leah DeWitt noted commencement has made her think about how she will be remembered at her funeral. “I hope that I am remembered for how I love,” said DeWitt, who will attend Cornell University.

“Love is the salve to the conflict of emotions we face,” she said. “As we sit in this room, perhaps overwhelmed with emotion, preparing to leave one stage of our lives and proceed to the next, remember this: You all are loved.”

Head of School Craig Sellers recalled the late Steve Jobs likened great innovation to high-altitude mountain climbing, requiring a committed team making sacrifices to make climbers safe and successful. That's true for great education as well, he said.

Sellers praised the team of parents and teachers who supported the graduates who, he said, laughed, served, learned “and had an enormous amount of fun on the way to the top.”

“The mountain is big, the mountain is beautiful and we are at the summit,” he said. “Let's place the flag, let's take lots of photographs and let's celebrate the accomplishments of the 62 people to my left: The Derryfield School Class of 2012.”

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Shawne Wickham may be reached at swickham@unionleader.com.
swickham@unionleader.com