Remarks As Prepared: SUNY Chancellor King Delivers Commencement Speech During SUNY Erie’s 2026 Graduation Ceremony
May 21, 2026
Buffalo, NY – State University of New York Chancellor John B. King Jr. addressed SUNY Erie Community College’s graduating Class of 2026 last evening. He proudly joined SUNY Trustees Eunice A. Lewin and Candice Vacin, SUNY Erie President Adiam Tsegai, State and local officials, and the campus community in celebration of this year’s graduates and their accomplishments. Chancellor King’s commencement speech honored the graduates for their perseverance, hard work, and sacrifice, and recognized the tremendous support throughout the SUNY Erie community and the friends and family members of each student.
Below are Chancellor King's remarks as prepared:
Good evening!
Thank you, Trustee Lewin for that kind introduction—and for representing our SUNY Board of Trustees today, along with Trustee Candice Vacin. I also want to recognize President Tsegai—who has led with an infectious passion for education and real vision for this campus—as an ECC alumna with deep roots in this community.
I’m thrilled that some of our local and state officials could join us today: our friend, Mo Sumbundu from Governor Hochul’s Office, Erie County Executive Mark Poloncarz, and Erie County Legislator Lawrence Dupree. And I’m grateful that our SUNY Vice Chancellor for Community Colleges, Valerie Dent, is with us; she is instrumental to the success of all our community colleges.
Thank you, as well, to the SUNY Erie Board Chair Jeff Stone and the other Board members, SUNY Erie Foundation Trustees, SUNY Erie faculty, staff, and—above all—the students.
What a joy and honor it is to be here!
I’m glad I made it. I was running a bit late. Then I heard I could take a slide in the City Campus Post Building to get here…and it would save me time? Is that right? No? Indeed, it’s a bit late for April Fool’s. But I love visiting SUNY’s community colleges in any season.
To paraphrase your legendary former Buffalo Bills coach, Marv Levy: there’s nowhere else I’d rather be than right here, right now. That’s because our community colleges are our utmost testaments to SUNY’s promise of affordable excellence, of economic opportunity, and upward mobility—I always relish any chance to visit and celebrate them.
But more than that: commencements are special days for graduates, as well as all the friends and family members who got them here. Completing your degrees took perseverance, hard work, and sacrifices. Through it all, though, there were faculty, staff, peers, and family members who uplifted, mentored, and encouraged you through all the challenges and moments of doubt. Let’s take a moment to pause and recognize those folks with a round of applause.
Now, I don’t mean to take away from your accomplishments, graduates, when I do this. But it’s long been my belief—on a very personal level—that there is so little we get done in this life alone. Without my own teachers, mentors, and adults in my life, I would not be here.
My mom and dad were both educators in New York City public schools. My mom passed away when I was just 8, and my dad died when I was 12. And in the time after my mom died, when it was just my dad and me, my dad struggled with Alzheimer’s. I never knew what to expect from one day to the next.
Some nights he’d be sad, other nights angry—even violent. As he got more and more sick, I took more and more responsibility in our house—making sure we had food, paying the bills. It was difficult, scary, and lonely.
But at school, at P.S. 276 in Canarsie, Brooklyn—it was a different story. School was the one place in my life that was safe, consistent, and nurturing. If not for Mr. Alan Osterweil, my teacher in the 4th, 5th, and 6th grades, I truly believe I wouldn’t be alive today.
In Mr. Osterweil’s class I had hope and purpose. We read the New York Times every day. We did productions of A Midsummer Night’s Dream – Shakespeare in elementary school – and Alice in Wonderland (where I was the rose with big red, felt petals sticking out of my head). We went on fantastic field trips to the American Museum of Natural History, the botanical gardens, and the ballet. P.S. 276 was the one place where I got to be a kid when I couldn’t be a kid at home.
I not only got to engage with and imagine a world beyond my own, but I formed real relationships. My ideas mattered, because Mr. Osterweil was genuinely curious about what 8- and 9-year-olds had to say about the Cold War or famine in Africa. He asked us serious questions. He treated learning like it was a grand adventure.
And although Mr. Osterweil’s class planted seeds that led to my becoming a social studies teacher, then a principal, and later New York State Education Commissioner and U.S. Education Secretary under President Obama—my path from there wasn’t linear, of course.
After my father died, I moved around between family members and schools. And like many teenagers who have experienced trauma, I was angry, and I didn’t know what to do with that anger. I got in so much trouble that I was kicked out of high school (I’m the first U.S. Secretary of Education to hold that distinction!).
It would have been easy for others to have looked at me — a Black and Latino young man with a family in crisis and no respect for authority — and given up, but I was lucky that teachers and a school counselor were willing to give me a second chance.
See, at every critical moment in my life, there was a person and a place that believed in my potential. They believed I was more than the things that had happened to me. They gave me tough love in measured doses; they nurtured my curiosity and love of learning.
I know there are so many stories out there today just like this. In the same way I felt “seen” by Mr. Osterweil, and found myself in the love of learning, I know Erie Community College is a place that sees the full picture of all the students who graduate today. And I’m betting that the folks about to walk across this stage are different people than they were when they started.
For lots of you, you may not have known how your journey would unfold when you began classes here. Like me, receiving your degree or finishing school was not a given. Lots of you found, here at ECC, a sense of belonging that taught you that persistence matters and setbacks are not endings.
You did it through study groups in the North Campus STEM building, hanging out together in the South Campus central lounge. You did it through outstanding athletic feats: a football team with a 9-1 finish, a cross-country team with a Top 10 national finish, hockey stars named first and second team all-American…and so many more. You did it while balancing your classes with caretaking responsibilities, jobs, long commutes, and all kinds of hardships.
And for lots of you getting your degrees today, this walk across the stage has been long and hard-fought, filled with fits and starts.
Like the single mother who returned to school and will earn her degree today in Mental Health and Substance Abuse counseling, who kept going because she wanted to show her daughter how to finish what you start. Her return to school was made possible through SUNY Reconnect—but first and foremost through her own resilience.
Like the chef and cookbook author who today receives his second Erie Community College degree—his first in culinary arts, today’s in Business Administration. This chef is constantly paying it forward, too—writing a cookbook for kids and one about how to cook in a college dorm. I could have used that one!
Like the Navy Veteran who receives this year’s Veteran’s Achievement Medal…who has served her nation honorably, and will go on to serve her community, graduating with a degree in dental hygiene today.
Today, I congratulate each and every one of you—not just for what you accomplished, not just for the barriers you’ve overcome, but for building the incredible and supportive community at ECC that allowed you and your peers to blossom.
I thank you for seeing each other and supporting each other—and I urge you to leave here committed to paying that support forward.
That will look different for each of you.
For those of you going into the workforce, maybe it means mentoring a colleague or encouraging them to further their own education.
For those transferring to a four-year institution, maybe it means befriending a student who is struggling, leading a campus club or service project, or starting a study group.
Of course, pause to celebrate today and honor the work you’ve done…and all it took to get here.
And then, graduates, please: take that spirit of both community and service with you.
I understand your motto is: start here, go anywhere. SUNY Erie Community College Class of 2026: I can’t wait to see where you’ll go.
Thank you.
About the State University of New York
The State University of New York is the largest comprehensive system of higher education in the United States, and more than 95 percent of all New Yorkers live within 30 miles of any one of SUNY’s 64 colleges and universities. Across the system, SUNY has four academic health centers, five hospitals, four medical schools, two dental schools, a law school, the country’s oldest school of maritime, the state's only college of optometry, 12 Educational Opportunity Centers, over 30 ATTAIN digital literacy labs, and manages one US Department of Energy National Laboratory. In total, SUNY serves about 1.7 million students across its portfolio of credit- and non-credit-bearing courses and programs, continuing education, and community outreach programs. SUNY oversees nearly a quarter of academic research in New York. Research expenditures system-wide are nearly $1.5 billion in fiscal year 2025, including significant contributions from students and faculty. There are more than three million SUNY alumni worldwide, and annually one in three New Yorkers who earn a college degree is a SUNY alum. To learn more about how SUNY creates opportunities, visit suny.edu.
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Holly Liapis
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