Bertha Mitchell and Belinda Brown were among hundreds of mothers who celebrated Mother's Day one day early yesterday, watching their children graduate from Winston-Salem State University.
"This is a great Mother's Day gift," Mitchell said. "It's the best gift you could ever receive, knowing that your child can be successful in life."
More than 700 students graduated during yesterday morning's ceremony at Joel Coliseum.
The graduating class was one of the largest in the school's history. A standing-room-only crowd of more than 12,000 relatives and friends cheered as the graduates received their diplomas.
Before the diplomas were handed out, graduates heard from various speakers.
Among them was Mayor Allen Joines, who encouraged them to consider staying in Winston-Salem and putting their knowledge and youthful energy to work locally.
Harold Respass, the student-government president, evoked President Obama in his speech.
"We have struggled, sacrificed and studied for so long," Respass said. "We have gone beyond, ‘Yes we can' and reached, ‘Yes we did.'"
Obama also came up in the keynote address, which was delivered by actor Hill Harper, who is currently one of the stars of the hit crime drama CSI: NY.
Harper attended Harvard Law School with Obama, and the two frequently played basketball together and talked about their goals and dreams.
Obama's success, Harper said, came from the fact that he charted his own course.
"This life you are going to lead is your life," Harper told the graduates. "This is a new time. You all are going to break conventional tradition."
Harper then broke with tradition himself by abandoning the podium and going out among the students with a wireless microphone. At one point, he even stood atop an empty seat to address the crowd.
Belinda Brown and her husband, Don, watched as their daughter, Amber Michelle Brown, became the first member of the family to graduate from a four-year college.
"It's all over, that's the best feeling ever," Amber Brown said afterward.
She earned a bachelor's degree in education, and managed to maintain a 4.0 grade-point average her last three semesters while working as a teacher's assistant and at other jobs.
She has known since she was in kindergarten that she wanted to be a teacher, inspired by her kindergarten teacher and by her mother, who is a teacher's assistant in a second-grade class in Holly Springs.
"I'm very proud of her," said Belinda Brown. "She has such a strong work ethic…. We told her when she went to college, ‘Make sure you make conscious decisions,' and she has made good choices."
Mitchell's daughter, Latrice Polite, got her master's degree in nursing and plans to be a nurse practitioner.
"I'm very proud of her," Mitchell said. "A mother couldn't ask for a better daughter."
Polite's daughter, Zharia Avery, is a second-grader at Griffith Elementary.
She was also glad about her mother's graduation, but for a different reason.
"I feel really happy, I get to spend more time with her while she's not in school," Zharia said.
Polite's academic success has, in turn, inspired her mother. Mitchell said that she is now in the process of earning a bachelor's degree from Salem College.
Mitchell also said she wasn't worried about Polite venturing out into a shaky economy.
"She can go out and make things happen for herself," Mitchell said.
■ Tim Clodfelter can be reached at 727-7371 or at tclodfelter@wsjournal.com.
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