In reflecting upon our time on the Hilltop, there are several words that immediately come to mind. Hoya Saxa, cura personalis, Jesuits and basketball are just a few of the phrases we can all remember seeing on a sign or T-shirt at least once while we’ve been here. While all of them represent what the past four years at Georgetown have meant to me, none of them fully capture what I’ll walk away from the Hilltop thinking.

The Senior Week shirts that were unveiled last week provide several more attempts at summing up the Hoya experience with lines like #HowLongsItBeen, #HolidayGala and #Norovirus. The shirts provide quite the recap of the fun and interesting experience it has been to be a member of the class of 2011, but they still fall short of a complete summation.

Then I start to think back upon four years of basketball games, Leo’s dinners and group meetings; the picture becomes more crowded still. When else will I get hours upon hours to hang out with friends debating politics, talking about sports or debating which Hogwarts houses best fit each undergraduate school? (After four long years I’ve embraced that the McDonough School of Business is Slytherin.) When else will I get to sit in Dahlgren Chapel for mass with one best friend and then the next night go to Passover seder with another? When else will I spend three years walking around a tiny campus with the same people, only to meet them through The Corp or an AGAPE retreat senior year and have them become my best friends?

It was only a few months ago that I learned the message that St. Ignatius Loyola gave to Francis Xavier before Xavier set out on missions around the world. The message to “go forth and set the world on fire” struck me like nothing else throughout my time at Georgetown. I gained even greater understanding during a talk from Fr. Kevin O’Brien, S.J., earlier this spring. O’Brien spoke directly to the seniors, saying that we can’t be afraid of leaving Georgetown despite the uncertainty of our future paths. He said that the point of Georgetown was to educate men and women so that they could go forth to share the knowledge they had gained here.

That was the moment when I realized I shouldn’t be worried about when, if ever, I’ll again get to experience those incredible things that my four years at Georgetown have been filled with. Georgetown isn’t just about the moments or time spent here on the Hilltop. Rather, the Georgetown experience is something far greater than just four years. All of the memories and ideas that have their genesis here at Georgetown are gifts and responsibilities that we must take forward with us.

We, as soon-to-be Hoya alumni, have to appreciate everything that Georgetown has meant to us. Part of that appreciation is the recognition that Georgetown isn’t just the physical space bound by the front gates and Reservoir Road. Georgetown is a community; it’s a family. And as a family, we must continue to share the memories we made here as we go out into the world. As part of alumni clubs, as groups of friends or just as individuals trying to do well in whatever our pursuits may be, Georgetown will be something we all carry with us.

Throughout the graduation exercises, I’m sure that I’ll get choked up and maybe even teary-eyed. I’m sure that seeing my friends walking before and after me to receive their diplomas will cause all those memories to flood through my mind. I’m sure there will be moments of sadness and uncertainty in the days and weeks ahead. But I’m sure that I will walk forward knowing that no matter where I go or what I do, I will always be a Hoya.

Thomas Lipinsky is a senior in the McDonough School of Business, the former president of Interhall and the former chair of The Corp Philanthropy Committee.

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