Hundreds of Hoyas in the Class of 2025 rang in this year’s commencement weekend singing along to “Georgetown Fight Song” at senior convocation.
From May 15-18, Georgetown celebrated the Class of 2025 and its nearly 5,700 graduates, who earned their degrees in May 2025 and now join the ranks of over 230,000 Georgetown alumni around the world.
“We are very, very proud of you. I encourage you to take a moment to reflect on all that you have achieved, all that you have experienced. You deserve that moment,” Interim President Robert M. Groves said at senior convocation. “Trust in the person you have become. You will forever be a part of the Georgetown community.”
Photos by Elman Studio.
Georgetown’s 10 schools in Washington, DC, celebrated individual commencement ceremonies and featured commencement speakers like Henry Winkler, Emmy Award-winning actor, director and author; Maria Van Kerkhove, interim director of epidemic and pandemic threat management at the World Health Organization; and Kono Taro (SFS’86), member of the House of Representatives in Japan.
“Be the most you can be. Because there are hurts to be healed, needs to be met, and if you are not the most you can be, something will remain undone forever,” Winkler said at the College of Arts & Sciences commencement ceremony.
(From left to right) Actor and director Henry Winkler at the College of Arts & Sciences ceremony (photo by Elman Studio); Ajaypal Banga, president of the World Bank, at the McDonough School of Business graduate ceremony; and Loretta S. Jemmott, M. Louise Fitzpatrick Endowed Professor of Community and Home Health Nursing at Villanova University’s Fitzpatrick College of Nursing, at the School of Nursing ceremony.
Recognizing the Graduating Class
At Georgetown, the graduates have grown in knowledge while being formed to make an impact in the world, Groves said.
“You have acquired knowledge that is both expansive and deep, knowledge of your chosen area of focus, knowledge of yourself and knowledge of how you can engage in the world around you and make your unique impact,” Groves said at senior convocation. “This is what we think we’re doing here. To form your own ideas and to deepen knowledge about yourself and the world around you.”
Made up of 1,707 undergraduate and 3,989 graduate students, the Class of 2025 includes a Rhodes Scholar, four Goldwater Scholars, war refugees, over 200 student-athletes and Hoyas who will enter military service. It’s a class that Georgetown will be proud to have as alumni, said Interim Provost Soyica Colbert.
“We know you. We know your talent, your drive, your idealism. We know well your generosity and your compassion,” Colbert said at convocation. “We have lived among you. We have taught you. We have tested you. And we could not be more pleased or proud of the results.”
Photos by Elman Studio.
For seniors like Julien Sims (B’25), the moment is bittersweet. He’s ready to enter the workforce and leave behind 15-page papers. At the same time, he understands the significance of the moment.
Julien Sims (B’25) with his mother, grandmother and extended family after the McDonough School of Business undergraduate commencement ceremony on May 17. Photo by Elman Studio.
Sims is a first-generation college graduate. Growing up on the South Side of Chicago, he watched his mother, father and grandmother start businesses while also struggling to make ends meet.
In high school, Sims built his own clothing brand and worked as a grocery store cashier to support his family. Along the way, his mother encouraged him to focus on his studies.
“I wanted better for not only myself but my family,” he said. “I was always told that academics was the way.”
Four years later, Sims is graduating from the McDonough School of Business as an accounting major. He will start a new job at a global investment firm in New York City this summer and hopes to promote financial literacy in communities like his own.
On graduation day, Sims’ parents, grandparents and extended family joined him to celebrate.
“I know that I have a huge support system that is rooting for me, loves me, and I love them back,” he said. “I just want to share that moment with them. Everything I do, I do it for them. They encourage me, and they’re my motivation.”
Senior Send-Off
Commencement weekend began with senior convocation on May 15. The undergraduate Class of 2025 processed onto Healy Lawn to shouts and cheers while bearing flags representing the dozens of countries the undergraduate students come from.
Undergraduates process onto Healy Lawn for senior convocation on May 15.
The over 1,700-strong undergraduate class includes graduates as young as 19 and as old as 47, those who have come from small rural communities and those who have held elected office in state government. Together, these Hoyas completed 69,732 classes and 158,342 credit hours at Georgetown.
In her address, Colbert urged the graduates to look forward with hope.
“Hope is a discipline. We have to work at hope. Hope is both the virtue and the time of sowing. Hope prepares thoughtfully and energetically for the harvest we desire,” Colbert said. “This is why we so confidently hope for you and hope in you. Because we know that whatever is out there, you go to face it prepared.”
Noa Offman (C’25) delivers her address at senior convocation.
Senior convocation also featured two student speakers, John DiPierri (SFS’25) and Noa Offman (C’25).
“We live in a time when worth is often measured by accumulation. Georgetown has offered us a more meaningful metric: contribution,” she said. “Because the brilliance of a Georgetown education isn’t just in preparing us for our future roles — it’s in challenging us to perform them differently. With purpose. With principle. With a commitment to something beyond ourselves.”
Alumna Rebecca Kuang (SFS’18) delivers the alumni address at senior convocation on May 15.
Alumna Rebecca Kuang (SFS’18), the New York Times bestselling author of The Poppy War trilogy and Yellowface, gave the alumni address. She shared how her family struggled for an education in China during the Cultural Revolution. She called the Class of 2025 to continue learning and seeking truth.
“A university is such an impossible fantasy — a place where we can test dangerous, unorthodox ideas; where we can dream up better worlds; where we can make mistakes, where we can change our minds,” Kuang said. “The life of the mind is a utopia, and history proves its precarity. It will die if we stop fighting for it.”
Class of 2025 By the Numbers
Photo by Elman Studio.
In May 2025, Georgetown added 5,696 graduates, including 1,707 undergraduate and 3,989 graduate students, to its ranks of more than 230,000 alumni worldwide.
The graduating class includes students from 47 states and Washington, DC, two U.S. territories and 45 other countries.
Georgetown University College of Arts & Sciences: 762 undergraduate students
Georgetown Law: 1,338 graduate students, including 8 S.J.Ds.
Graduate School of Arts & Sciences: 366 graduate students and 215 graduate students in Biomedical Graduate Education
McCourt School of Public Policy: 212 graduate students
McDonough School of Business: 322 undergraduate and 686 graduate students
School of Continuing Studies: 518 graduate and 21 undergraduate students
School of Medicine: 182 M.D. graduates, including 6 M.D./Ph.D., 4 M.D./MBA and 1 M.D./MPH
School of Nursing: 25 undergraduate and 283 graduate students
School of Health: 89 undergraduate and 17 graduate students
Walsh School of Foreign Service: 488 undergraduate, including 95 undergraduate students from Georgetown University in Qatar, and 359 graduate students
Photos by Elman Studio.
Over their time at Georgetown, the Class of 2025 accumulated numerous awards and prestigious scholarships, including:
1 Big East Undergraduate Research Poster Symposium – First Place Medal
