MW
Miles Wilcox
  • Class of 2012
  • Del Mar, CA

Miles Wilcox Graduates from Bard College at Simon's Rock

2012 May 23

Miles Wilcox of Del Mar, CA, recently graduated from Bard College at Simon's Rock with a Bachelor of Arts degree in Music.

The first early college, Simon's Rock is the only residential college in the country specifically designed to let bright, highly motivated students start college immediately after the 10th or 11th grade. Students receive their Associate of Arts (A.A.) degree after two years of study and the Bachelor of Arts (B.A.) degree after four.

Wilcox was one of 172 students to graduate from the early college on Saturday, May 19, 2012. Sixty four undergraduates received their B.A. degrees and 108 received their A.A. degrees.

Poet Laureate Philip Levine delivered the commencement address. Simon's Rock Provost Peter Laipson introduced Mr. Levine, noting that "in a different time and place, he might well have been a Rocker, for he has demonstrated throughout his life a fearlessness that is also characteristic of every student who leaves high school early."

In his address, Mr. Levine wove a story about the force of language and poetry, reminding us that "words have enormous power." The poet sent the graduates forward with the following words, "Let those blessings [of poetry] and the schooling that is soul-making, continue without end on this brimming landscape. Let this graduation day complete itself. Accept it all, taste its ripeness as fully as you can, and then let this day die into the starry darkness of the waiting night, so a new day can be born."

Bard College at Simon's Rock (www.simons-rock.edu), a leader in educational innovation for more than 40 years, is home to over 400 undergraduates who typically graduate one or two years ahead of their peers.