On Saturday, May 13, the Elizabethtown College Class of 2023 was recognized for its strong commitment to academics, deep determination, and consistent persistence. With the COVID-19 pandemic interrupting the second semester of their first year at Etown, the graduates were also commended for their ability to adapt to changes and make opportunities out of disruption.

“Class of 2023, as you reflect on your time as a student at Etown this weekend, reminisce the good moments, recall the difficult moments that helped you to build your character and made you stronger, and remember you always have a home here,” Elizabethtown College President Betty Rider addressed the Class of 2023.

View a video of the Class of 2023 Commencement Exercises.

A total of 605 graduates from all six undergraduate Schools along with the School of Graduate and Professional Studies (SGPS) were recognized in the Dell alongside family and friends. Milton Hershey School President Pete Gurt served as this year’s Commencement speaker.

“It doesn’t matter what is happening around you,” President Gurt shared in his remarks to the Class of 2023. “You have the ability… the choice… to find good… to find beauty in everything and everyone.”

A 1985 alumnus of Milton Hershey School, President Gurt has devoted himself as an accomplished academic administrator reaching the highest enrollment in school history with 2,189 students during the 2019-20 academic year, implementing three state-registered pre-apprenticeship programs, launching the first in the state in 2017-18, and receiving full-accreditation by the Commission on Accreditation for Law Enforcement Agencies in 2017. MHS was the first pre-K through 12th-grade residential school to receive the international honor.

President Gurt has led the school’s early childhood education initiative, Catherine Hershey Schools for Early Learning (CHS). Six CHS Early Childhood Education Centers will open in Pennsylvania, including one in Elizabethtown.  

“We’ll be partnering with your great school through programs, curriculum, internships, and career opportunities for Etown grads,” President Gurt explained on Saturday. “Our future together is limitless.”

The Centers will provide a cost-free educational, social, and cognitive program to children from six weeks to age five from economically disadvantaged and at-risk backgrounds. The Lancaster County CHS Centers are expected to begin operating in 2026.

President Gurt was presented with an honorary Doctor of Education degree, along with Robert “Bob” O. Kerr, M.D. ‘64, who received an honorary Doctor of Science degree. An advocate for the health sciences, Dr. Kerr is an international researcher, renowned oncologist, and esteemed 1964 alumnus of the College. Dr. Kerr and his wife, Mary Ann, also a 1964 Elizabethtown College graduate, have graciously supported the College through capital initiatives and by creating the Ranck Prize for Research Excellence Endowment as well as the Robert and Mary Ann Kerr Distinguished Student Achievement Endowment Fund.

Class of 2023 President Brooke Kaley Charria ’23 addressed the class and encouraged her peers to continue to persevere through obstacles that they face after graduation, as well as to continue living by the College’s Educate for Service motto to help others and make an impact on their community.

“Everyone here today has their own story, their own unique and different college experience, and challenges,” Charria said in her address to the class.” But all of us graduating today are more than ready to face the world head-on. 

“In this beloved Dell today are the minds, the hands, and the hearts that are going to change this uncertain world, and that is all thanks to what we have learned both in and out of the classroom at Elizabethtown College.”

The ceremony also included remarks delivered by Board of Trustee Vice Chairman (Chair-Elect FY24) Michael S. Spangler ’88, Alumni Council President TaLisa M. Ramos-Watts ’11, and an invocation and benediction offered by Chaplain & Director of Spiritual and Religious Life Rev. Amy Shorner-Johnson. You can view the ceremony in its entirety at etown.edu.

View more photos from the day on Elizabethtown College’s Flickr page.