“The future belongs to you!” John Krasinski ’01 found that old saw absolutely terrifying when he was a graduating senior. “Whoa, what?!” he said. “I am currently searching for an apartment, trying to keep the number of roommates in single digits. Literally nothing belongs to me!” Instead, in his Baccalaureate speech, Krasinski talked about the risks Brown encouraged him to take: “I leapt out of my comfort zone, then stayed [out] there, then leapt again.” He praised the lifelong value of Brown’s community—people who are “to be relied upon to take risks, provoke thought, and to be committed participants in this world,” he said. “I know that tomorrow you will all receive a piece of paper that says you got one of the best educations there is to get,
period. I also know that that education didn’t necessarily happen in the classroom.”