︎v.1, your student-run publication, is hosting a window-making event for Families’ Weekend (Saturday, Oct. 19th)!

Find our table in the vestibule of the Design Center to draw or write what you see and what you wish to see out your window this Saturday, Oct. 19, from 11AM-2PM. These drawings will be displayed in our installation in the Color Lab’s window for all to see! We will also incorporate these one-of-a-kind drawings as bookmarks for our window-themed Fall issue ~ look out for our release day announcement to find your bookmark inside.

︎Here’s a sneak preview of v.1’s Fall issue

We couldn’t wait to share this beautiful commencement speech by alum and former v.1 editor Graciela Batista, who touches on the perennial theme of community in ways we love. – v.1 editors

Thank you Provost Ghadessi, President Williams, and class of 2024. Thank you to the family and friends that are present. And thank you to every person I’ve met, cherished, and loved at RISD. It’s an honor to be speaking with you all today.

When I was 12 years old, what I was worried most about in life was who my best friend was, or was going to be. I just hadn’t found them. I moved from Orlando to Puerto Rico right at the end of elementary school so having a lifelong best friend was out of the picture.

I envied the best friends who had photos of themselves from many years back, and the moms who were also best friends. Everyone around me seemed to have found their person and I was left out. I understood friendship in an idealistic way. I thought they were effortless, people you giggled with, and sometimes cried with. Most importantly, I understood best friends as people who stayed with you year after year. I never thought about the inevitable fights, the slights, or the drifting apart. I never wondered if friendship could be hard.

How time has passed, class of 2024. As a momentous 4 years comes to a close, and as we prepare to disperse as soon as tomorrow, I've been thinking about my friendships more, and both how hard and how easy it is to have them slip away. I've also realized that friendships are more complex and rich than I ever understood at a young age, and that the same support, consistency, and care that I desperately sought from a single person then, is what I have been able to receive from my friends, and more broadly, my communities at RISD.

Community has been essential to me here—a place of rest, motivation, and inspiration. My community includes new friendships, old ones, the workers at the Met or Portfolio, my roommates, all the co-workers and classmates I've ever had, and the people who pass me on the sidewalk so frequently they offer a smile every time, even though we’ve never exchanged a word. It amazes me always, the incredible vastness of people around us all the time, the sheer amount of potential for connection, especially in college.

So, as college comes to a close, I wonder: Where are we going to find community next? I mean out in the world with no institution binding our interests, habits, and schedules together. Now’s the time to hold on to those around us, but maybe more importantly, to strengthen our skills in making community and friends no matter where we go.

In truth, RISD was not an automatic community for me. In Puerto Rico, we shared a place of being, a culture, and a language. Colleges offer the same promise plus parades, packed stadiums, campus pride, and silly stuff like that.

RISD is a little different in that regard. Divided by majors, a dispersed campus, and just being too busy to socialize, our sense of connection is sometimes challenged. At RISD, I actually had to dig a bit deeper, and wider, to find my communities. And after the childhood I described, I was ready to change that feeling. I really wanted to forge community. And so I learned how. Today felt like a good chance to share with you what I've learned.

First, community is intentional. You have to do community and put in the time, work, and effort. We must reach out to one another, ask about each other’s days, be there in times of need, and celebrate in times of achievement! Community will not simply land in the palm of your hand but you will find it when you seek it.

Second, community is urgent. The times the RISD community felt most united is when we’ve gathered around a cause—maybe those moments feel so powerful because of their rarity. A little over a year ago, last spring, herds of students, faculty, and staff rallied around ProvWash calling for fair wages for the caretakers of our buildings and grounds.

On those same steps, this Spring, we, again, gathered in unity for Palestinian rights, for our fellow students, and for students all over the country standing up for justice. We can care for people thousands of miles away, as much as we do those we share space with. Urgent community reminds us of the genuine power in a collective working to achieve a similar goal through an authentic support system.

Community is also physical. I’m talking about the Mr. Rogers Neighborhood sort of community. Who are the people around you every day you may not be that close to, but simple consistency—passing on the street, sitting on the bus, buying a coffee—binds you together? When everything in your life can feel like it's falling apart, it's important to recognize those people, and relish in an extraordinary ordinary.

Community is extended. I've had the pleasure of working with many local nonprofit organizations like CityArts, Project Open Door, New Urban Arts, and the RISD Art Circle, which all reach out a hand to youth who need it, and don’t let go, supporting them long into the future. I’ve considered that I’ve needed those spaces almost as much as the teens they serve. Breaking out of your day to day to connect with others outside your immediate life, sometimes means more than you will ever know.

Last, community is radiant. We have been here for four years, working tirelessly over projects, paintings, sculptures, and designs that are dear to our hearts and minds because of concepts so personal to us as creators. We are endlessly vulnerable, embodying our most intimate thoughts in our work. We then connect with those who witness, understand, and accept what we put on the table, extending community through what we make.

So, community is intentional, urgent, physical, extended, and radiant.

And one more thing: Community, like friendship, is hard. It requires time, effort, care, and patience. I am excited to step out into a world where I know so many of us will continue to build community wherever we go, learning from what we’ve managed to build here in only a few years. Starting tomorrow, let’s all take the bus somewhere new, find a non-profit to volunteer at, ask strangers for their names, and make a plan to see that friend we’ve felt has been drifting. People care and want to care. Our communities are where that care happens.

I’m honored to have discovered and been part of so many communities with all of you. Look around! Who has been your community? How have they shown up for you and how did you do the same? How will you do that for others in the next chapter of our lives?

My dad has this saying he would always mention when he would try to get me to go to some networking event: that life is like a snowball going downhill, and as we go, we should collect and connect with the people we encounter. Community is more genuine than a networking context, but it's the same idea: gather as you go. Resonate with the newness of relationships. Practice breaking out of your comfort zone, and welcome people in, they might surprise you.

Class of 2024, I am so, so, proud of us! As someone who didn't get a high school graduation, as many of us didn't due to the pandemic, I feel extra lucky to say—congratulations guys, we did it.

Zadie and Teju