In 1970 President Nixon had just announced the US invasion of Cambodia, igniting Vietnam War protests at universities around the country. Mary Elizabeth “Tipper” Gore and fellow BU students joined the movement, marching up Comm Ave in antiwar T-shirts, carrying hand-painted signs. They were angry, and they were mobilized. Then they were sent home. On May 5, 1970, a day after National Guardsmen opened fire on unarmed protestors at Kent State University, killing four students, BU President Arland Christ-Janer canceled finals and Commencement.

Gore (CAS’70) shared the story of her early activism—a harbinger of her ongoing career in advocacy and philanthropy—during a one-on-one conversation with Ann Cudd, dean of Arts & Sciences, at an Alumni Weekend 2017 event at the Tsai Performance Center. The former Second Lady of the United States has been a lifelong advocate for children and families, the LGBTQ community, people who are homeless, those who suffer from mental illness, and many other groups in need of a voice. She headlined Alumni Weekend, September 13–17, which packed in 113 events attended by more than 3,000 alums.

Gore, who was President Bill Clinton’s mental health policy advisor, led alums through a photographic retrospective of her career, from early work as a newspaper photographer documenting poverty and other issues to political activism that included a medical mission to Rwanda after the genocide there to recent activism involving her efforts to end gun violence. Following the talk, Cudd joined her onstage for a revealing discussion that touched on the current presidential administration and Gore’s hopes for the next generation of civic leaders. “Human liberties, and civil liberties and rights, are at stake,” Gore said. “I don’t know what’s not at stake; everything is at stake….The fate of our democracy hangs in the balance and depends on [young people] being engaged and active.”

Former US Second Lady Tipper Gore showed a retrospective from her photography career and conversed with Arts & Sciences Dean Ann Cudd during Alumni Weekend. Gore received BU’s Distinguished Alumni Award for her lifelong advocacy on behalf of those in need of a voice. Photo by Jake Belcher

At the Best of BU Luncheon at the Metcalf Ballroom, Gore received a Distinguished Alumni Award. Her two fellow honorees echoed her call to action. In a fiery acceptance speech, Cornell William Brooks (STH’87, Hon.’15), a lawyer and former NAACP president, said the award acknowledged “those who seek the right to vote, those who seek to live lives of meaning though they have a criminal record, those who seek justice in places that are hard and rocky. This award recognizes them, it recognizes their hope, their set of aspirations for this nation.” His speech culminated with a recitation of James Weldon Johnson’s poem “Lift Ev’ry Voice and Sing,” which the NAACP adopted as its official song: “Facing the rising sun of our new day begun, / Let us march on till victory is won.”

Brooks is a School of Theology and School of Law visiting professor of social ethics, law, and justice movements.

International health and human rights activist Mahesh Maskey (SPH’01) dedicated the award to his mother, who he described as a “hardworking daughter, daughter-in-law, wife, denied of educational opportunities, a typical representative woman of her time.” Among his many achievements as a public health leader in Asia, Maskey developed a method of monitoring maternal health that has lowered the death rate in Nepal and other developing countries, and he played a key role in instituting the country’s free universal health care.

Accepting his award, Maskey spoke of his realization that “the search for truth is necessary, but not sufficient. Equally important is to be aware in whose service these truths, discoveries, and advances are being put. Does the race to economic prosperity have to be won at the cost of our fragile ecosystem? In pursuit of our dreams, are we justified to destroy the habitat that sustains all life forms in our lonely planet?” He added, “If the answer to these questions is a resounding ‘No,’ then we are left with the burden of finding an alternative. The search for this alternative has been one fine tradition of this great university.”

The alums’ activism resonated with Chloe Konarski (SON’73,’75), a nurse with a private practice in mental health, who made the drive from Plympton, Mass., with her sister, Ann DeNardis (Questrom’82), and her niece, Julia DeNardis (Questrom’14), to attend the ceremony and Gore’s talk. Julia DeNardis said that Konarski was the impetus behind BU’s becoming the family alma mater.

BU President Robert Brown with Alumni Award winners (from left) Mahesh Maskey (SPH’01), Cornell William Brooks (STH’87, Hon.’15), Tipper Gore (CAS’70), and BU Alumni Association President Mary Perry at the Best of BU Awards.

Ann DeNardis recalled going with her parents when they drove Konarski to campus her sophomore year. They arrived in the midst of a Vietnam War protest, complete with dogs and police in riot gear. Konarski didn’t even bother to stop at her dorm; she joined the crowd. “That was the kind of school BU was, which sold me,” DeNardis said. Growing up with this story, Julia knew early on that “BU was my school, too.”

DeNardis said that the three women shared with the award winners the determination “that they were going to show up and speak their minds, and protest: ‘I don’t accept the way it is, I want something more, something better.’ I think that’s the motto of BU.”

The spirit of activism and advocacy infused a daylong celebration of writer, human rights activist, and Nobel Peace Prize Laureate Elie Wiesel (Hon.’74), BU’s Andrew W. Mellon Professor Emeritus in the Humanities, who died on July 2, 2016. Among the speakers at the event, In Memory of Elie Wiesel: A Day of Learning & Celebration, hosted by the Elie Wiesel Center for Jewish Studies, was BU President Robert A. Brown. “Elie was arguably the leading witness to the horrors of the Holocaust. His tragic experience and his gift as a storyteller conferred a moral obligation to ensure that future generations could know the full magnitude of evil, loss, and suffering,” Brown said. “He was perforce an eloquent witness. He was by choice a teacher, and happily for Boston University, one of the great teachers in our history.”

Wiesel was honored with performances by the HaZamir Chamber Choir and BU’s Inner Strength Gospel Choir, and addresses by scholars, religious leaders, writers, activists, former students, and colleagues describing how Wiesel’s teachings extended beyond remembrance of the Holocaust, beyond Judaism.

“When I see friends standing up for DACA Dreamers,” said Wiesel’s son, Elisha Wiesel, referring to the American immigration policy Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals, which President Donald Trump wants to change, “or refusing to accept false moral equivalence in Charlottesville, or demanding that the world recognize the Jewish state of Israel’s right to exist…I feel him with us. It was not just what my father said—it was how he lived his life. He treated others as he would have wanted to be treated, with gentleness. It is my belief that in this sense, the messenger was the message.”

Martha Hauptman, Wiesel’s assistant of 27 years, recalled what he told students who were “overwhelmed with how much was going on in the world and how much there was to do. He said, ‘Do something. Anything. Just start somewhere to fix the world.’”

Nominations for the 2018 Distinguished Alumni Awards are due by December 15, 2017. Submit a nomination here.