Photo courtesy Flickr Creative Commons.
A selection committee chose College senior Orli Berman as this year’s class orator, who will speak at the College of Arts and Sciences’ diploma ceremony as part of Commencement on May 11, according to a Friday press release from the College.
The only speaker at the diploma ceremony, Berman, an international studies and economics major from Bethesda, Maryland, applied for the opportunity to serve as class orator and, along with 25 other applicants and students nominated by College seniors, wrote a 500-word version of her speech to the committee. She and several other selected finalists then auditioned for the position by revising their original address for a five-minute speech before the committee.
For her address, Berman said she reached out to 50 seniors involved in various campus groups and asked them questions about their feelings toward the University as a way to draw on their experiences and produce a more wholesome, comprehensive speech.
Senior Associate Dean for Undergraduate Education Joanne Brzinski and College of Arts and Sciences Dean Robin Forman informed Berman that the committee had chosen her as the class orator on March 25.
Since her audition, Berman said, she has reorganized the discussion to focus on what most seniors believed to be the most dynamic aspect of the Emory community.
“The major responses were social justice, decreased amount of apathy and increased school spirit — not Emory as a whole, but for a lot of smaller communities within Emory,” she said. “When I revised the speech, it became a lot more organic and had a lot more weight.”
Berman is a member of Omicron Delta Kappa and Mortar Board honor societies and Kappa Kappa Gamma sorority. She has served as president, vice president and treasurer of Emory Model United Nations; an Orientation Leader and Orientation Captain; an executive member of the Jewish student organization Hillel and a research fellow for the Center for the Study of Law, Policy and Economics, according to the release. A Spirit of Emory Award winner, Berman will serve as a business analyst at the Atlanta-based consulting firm Deloitte after graduating.
— By Lydia O’Neal
