Graduation Speech 2026,
by Willemijn Eijsink

Good afternoon everyone. Thank you for being here to share this special moment with us. We are truly grateful to have you.

Welcome to our families – our parents, siblings and grandparents. Thank you for standing by us on this journey from day one. Without your love and support we would not be standing here in these caps. And to family that is no longer with us, we hope you are watching from above with pride.

Welcome to our friends – those in this graduating class, in other year groups, those watching online from overseas… All the people who have held us through stress and doubt with home-cooked meals and walks through Flevopark. But also cheered at our accomplishments and danced their hearts out with us at Dormfest. Thank you for sharing our joy, and for celebrating with us today too.

And of course, welcome to our teachers and staff. There is lots to thank you for, but we’ll get to that in just a moment. To everyone here in-person and everyone watching online: it is an absolute honour to be speaking before you.

In my role as chair of the Student Council this year, I’ve spent a lot of time thinking about questions like “what is the point of Liberal Arts and Sciences? Why should AUC exist? And, what value do we add to UvA and VU?”

Now, of course those questions matter. But in my opinion, there is a much more important and fundamental question: “what value does AUC have for us, its students?”

Part of the answer, I think, is quite simple: the opportunity to learn from brilliant teachers in a small classroom. To our teachers: you challenged us when we needed pushing, patiently explained concepts (as many times as it took) when we got stuck and happily got to know us in class breaks. Thank you for inspiring us with your passion and for helping us feel like we belong in our field, whether it be physics or culture or neuroscience or international relations, just to name a few. It has been an honour to have you guide the development of our skills, interests and personhoods.

I’d like to pause here in memory of Dr Michael McAssey, who we lost very recently. He was the embodiment of so much of what I just described. Beyond the wonderful sense of humour that made anyone feel at ease with him, he was known for his exceptional commitment to his students, his tutees and anyone that asked him for help. He will be sorely missed. We wish his family, friends and loved ones strength in this difficult time.

But AUC is more than its classrooms. We are equally grateful to the fantastic faculty and support staff that made our studies here possible. The registrar team, who answered our silly questions about course registration. The services and communications team who kept us in the loop on everything exciting going on at AUC. The admissions team that let us into this place! But also the housemasters and receptionists, who always greeted us warmly. The Heads of Studies that helped shape our unique, curated course offering. And the administration, whom we wish the best of luck navigating what’s to come for AUC. Still, I’d like to return to this question for my fellow graduating class: what did studying at AUC bring you?

To me, what AUC gives – or, gifts – most of all is a community of people searching for their place in the world. People who, like you, are just trying something, realising it’s not quite right, pivoting, trying again.

You might say that this kind of ‘figuring out’ is just what people do in their early twenties. That might be true, but at AUC, our famous ‘bubble’ is really a greenhouse: a warm place where ideas grow until they are strong enough to be taken outside and face the world.

In this greenhouse, questions that push you into unknown territory become inescapable. A class discussion about climate justice might easily be followed by a late-night conversation on the dorms’ balconies about capitalism and personal versus corporate responsibility.

Flicking through my own journals from these past years, I notice how often I grappled with big questions: academic, personal, moral… I remember one afternoon in April of particularly acute doubt about my path in chemistry. With a pounding heart and muddled head, I called a friend. She came quickly, and she sat with me and helped me write a list of conditions I should meet before committing to a Master’s. That kind of company is the second thread running through my entries: gratitude to be among people who will sit with me in uncertainty.

As for the verdict from that afternoon? I’m taking a gap year. Anyway, as AUC looks to its future, I hope our identity as a home for searchers is retained. AUC is a haven for people still finding their footing, with passion and engagement. That home is worth protecting.

Part of our passion and engagement is, of course, engagement with international events that move our community deeply. Each generation has a cause that lies close to their hearts. For many of us in today’s graduating class, that cause is Gaza, where the atrocities have been a source of grief, moral urgency and, at times, contention within our own community.

It is partly from that place of grief and urgency that many of this cohort joined a long-standing tradition of student protest here in Amsterdam. We have been met with accusations of radicalism and being out of touch. But I think that perception fails to see what we actually stood for: a world of peace, of justice and respect for human dignity.

You might have noticed the flowers on stage or the students wearing keffiyehs in their graduation photos. These scarves have been a symbol of Palestinian resistance since 1936. Today, they are worn to remind us of how privileged we are to graduate, and to commemorate the students in Gaza from whom that opportunity was taken. The scarves also serve as a question to ourselves, our institutions, governments and communities. That question is: in the face of suffering, are we the kind to look away, or to look closer?

I am proud to be part of a community that spoke out against injustice and pushed our university to take action. I encourage this class to hold on to that change-making spirit, and the hope that sustains it.

In the words of the Palestinian poet Haneen Abu-Obeid:

“My love, the heart is the last unoccupied country.

Every revolution begins there.

We don't need bridges, gardens or cities.

We need hope and hope that feels hungry.

So when the bridge is taken, remember:

The heart is the last unoccupied country.”

Now of course, we do not all have such mastery of words. But we are all poets, in the broadest sense of the word. I make this point inspired by Audre Lorde, who defined poetry not as words-craft, but as the distillation of deep, instinctive feelings that allows us to “give name to the nameless so that it can be thought”.

In academia, as in life, we work with abstract concepts. We take observations and translate them into words so that theories can be thought. And not just thought, but understood, debated, challenged, built upon.

This is how academia makes progress. It hinges on our ability to distill difficult concepts into something communicable. This is a skill that has been asked from all of us at some point in our time here. AUC has, in that sense, made a poet out of us all. Every time you have searched for the right words to describe something previously elusive, you have been sharpening your craft.

Now as we prepare to step up and out into the world, I’d like to encourage you to share your craft too. Bring us right up next to you, point your finger at the world and tell us what you see. The world waits to see with you, not look at you.

Class of 2026, I stand here with so much awe for the talent, drive and achievement in this room. Congratulations to us all – we have actually made it! As we embark on our next adventures, I wish everyone here the best in sharing the poetry of academia and the poetry of life. Thank you.