By Dom Lovallo
Managing Editor
For the first time in school history, students were involved in selecting the keynote speaker for graduation.
After being nominated by students, the Board of Trustees approved Chris LaPlaca, ’79, to be the keynote speaker at St. Bonaventure University’s 157th commencement ceremony.
When Sr. Margaret Carney, O.S.F., resided as president, she would pick the keynote speaker. When Interim President Andrew Roth took over, he wanted student feedback on who the speaker should be, said Rick Trietley, vice president of student affairs.
According to Trietley, the senior class was excited to be given the chance to nominate people to speak at commencement.
“I just think that our student body, especially our senior class each year, views commencement as their celebratory event. A culmination of four years hard work,” said Trietley. “I think the opportunity to have input into who would be delivering that at commencement, that speech, was very important to them and they were very excited about it.”
Trietley added that students were excited to know their nomination was chosen.
The Student Government Association had one of their biggest discussions about who they should pick, said Erin Bilello, a senior journalism and mass communication major.
“We spent like 15, 20 minutes talking about it,” said Bilello, SGA’s executive board secretary. “And we got about eight or 10 names during the meeting and then I said, ‘Can everyone go talk to their friends,’ because we wanted to make this as inclusive as possible and get as many students involved, especially the senior class. Sometimes I feel like there are some commencement speakers, like who are they, how did they pick them? So, I think it’s cool students got to pick this time.”
Seniors couldn’t find any reason for LaPlaca not to be the keynote speaker, said Bilello.
“No one ever has anything bad to say about him,” said Bilello. “He’s been honored by the Jandoli school, he’s been honored for a bunch of things and he’s an alumnus that keeps coming back, and keeps coming to give back. I think he is the ideal Bonaventure person. He made it so big and still gives back to the small school.”
LaPlaca, an ESPN executive was honored to be asked to give the keynote speech and said there was added emotion when he was told the students chose him.
“My mind could not compute the request,” said LaPlaca. “They called and scheduled, I was told it was going to be about something else, and then it was this.”
It didn’t take long for LaPlaca to say yes to the offer.
“I just sat and smiled for a minute,” said LaPlaca. “And they said, ‘what do you think?’ and I said, ‘I’m tremendously honored and I’d love to do it.’ It didn’t take long to say yes… I gave them a little bit of time. I said, ‘you have the weekend to change your mind and come to your senses.’ And they never got back to me. They did it, I said yes and now everyone is stuck with it.”
LaPlaca said he’s taking this very seriously, and not a day goes by when he doesn’t think about the speech. He knows how important it is, and he wants it to be something students can remember over 15 years from now.
