By Jennifer Price
GW senior Zoe Petkanas will speak at Commencement on the National Mall in front of 25,000 people, before first lady Michelle Obama takes the stage.
No pressure, right?
Ms. Petkanas, who is a student in the Elliott School of International Affairs, was selected out of eight contestants as the student commencement speaker Friday by a panel of judges. The students each gave a two-minute speech—the same speech they would have given at Commencement.
Ms. Petkanas spoke about GW being a unique university by sitting in the heart of the nation’s capital.
“It was September 2006, and on the way to my first college class, I somehow ended up on Pennsylvania Avenue watching the presidential motorcade roar past. And at that moment, I knew GW was not going to be a typical college experience,” she said in front of a judging committee made up of GW faculty, staff and students.
“We’ve interned. We’ve hosted presidents. We’ve had professors who do what they teach. We’ve sat together in front of the White House when Barack Obama was elected president, and we froze together on the National Mall as we watched him take the oath of office. Our experience has transcended the walls of the university.”
Jill Kasle, GW’s student speaker competition chair and university marshal, was looking for poise and confidence.
“When your voice is bouncing off the Smithsonian museums and you’re speaking in front of 25,000 people, you can’t panic,” said Ms. Kasle.
Last year, Ms. Petkanas, of Putnam Valley, N.Y., studied abroad in Jordan, examining women’s empowerment and micro financing. She’s taken eight semesters of Arabic at GW and will be going to Muscat, Oman this summer for two months of intensive Arabic studying through a U.S. State Department Critical Language Fellowship.
“My experiences at GW led me to find my motivation and act on it with passion,” she said. “It has been my fellow students who have inspired me the most, who have pushed me to reach higher and aspire to do more.”
Students begin competing for the speaking position at their individual school. Each school holds a competition or selection process to choose a student to speak at the school’s diploma ceremony. Schools set their own criteria for participation in the competition such as a specific grade point average. Then one student from each school (two from the Columbian College) gets to compete in the university-wide competition.
“This is a particularly exciting commencement for us since we now know first lady Michelle Obama will be there,” said GW President Steven Knapp.
Ms. Petkanas is waiting to hear if she received a Fulbright Scholarship for the fall and plans to apply for the Rhodes, the George Mitchell and the Marshall scholarships next year.
“Graduation is ultimately for the students so they want to see one of their own on stage summing up their experiences,” said Ms. Kasle.
While traveling through poor neighborhoods and refugee camps in the Middle East, Ms. Petkanas saw poverty, disenfranchisement and disempowerment firsthand.
She plans to tell GW graduates that the world is a scary place, but “honestly I can’t think of any group of people more suited and more qualified to solve these problems. I can’t wait to see what we accomplish.”
Ms. Petkanas said getting to speak at Commencement is an unbelievable honor.
“I’m so excited to speak about my experiences here,” she said. “It’s been an incredible four years.”
As for calming the nerves, Ms. Petkanas said she will look to her theater experience at GW, take a deep breath and tell herself to have fun.
“But you never really get rid of all the nerves,” she said. “It’s impossible.”