About 400 students graduated from Lincoln University Saturday morning in the first commencement ceremony held at The LINC, the new Lincoln University/ Jefferson City Parks and Recreation wellness center on the LU campus.
Departing LU President Kevin Rome gave the commencement address to the students and hundreds of spectators. Graduates celebrated by dancing and waving their way across the stage as they received their diplomas. One first-generation college graduate said the day ended eight years of hard work.
At times, the ceremony felt like a graduation for both students and Rome, the school's president for the past four years. LU announced in March Rome will become the 16th president of Fisk University in Nashville, Tennessee, which is also a historically black college like Lincoln.
"We have reached a time for us - you and me - to depart Lincoln University," he told the students early in his address.
Rome, a Morehouse College graduate, came to Jefferson City in June 2013. His tenure at Lincoln included efforts to grow the number of students attending the school from around the country and to expand educational connections with universities in other countries.
But his tenure was also marred by controversies surrounding communications with the faculty, the de-activation and re-activation of the history degree program - including the termination of two, tenured history professors at the end of this school year - and the faculty's no confidence vote in Said Sewell, LU's now-former provost and vice president of Academic Affairs.
The school also ended its associate of applied science degree program and the bachelor of music education and bachelor of science with an emphasis in sacred music degree program before this year. And Lincoln cut the tennis and baseball programs for this school year.
"There are those who may be critical of me for my time at Lincoln, but I depart with no bad will and only love and good wishes," Rome said. "
Rome quoted Michael Jackson, Dr. Seuss and William Shakespeare in his address. He told students there's a time to tear down and a time to build. Life will change, whether they want it to or not. So he closed his address by telling them to simply live life to the fullest.
"Everything and everyone has a season." Rome said. "It's your time. It may have taken some of you longer than you desired or your family expected, but you have arrived at your graduation day."
Johnathan Jackson, a senior who graduated with a bachelor's of marketing, knows this well.
About 40 minutes before the ceremony started, he beamed as he gathered with fellow graduates, took pictures with his cousin and kissed his best friend on her cheek.
Around his neck, he wore a necklace with the ashes of his grandma who died about a year ago. On his cap he wrote words in white, yellow, red and green letters that said, "Somebody said it couldn't be done But I did it for the culture," in cutout cardboard.
Jackson, a Kansas City native, said he'd waited for this day for eight years. Originally enrolled at LU in the fall of 2009, he left Lincoln after only one year because he convinced himself there was something better in the world for him. Later, he realized he made a mistake and hated living the paycheck-to-paycheck lifestyle he found himself in.
For 21/2 years, he worked a series of odd jobs around Kansas City - including at 24 Hour Fitness, a valet service and mobile phone company - while he lived at home with his mom. So he decided to return to LU for the spring semester in 2013.
"I felt like if I couldn't finish this, I couldn't finish anything else," Jackson said. "It was the hardest two years of my life."
His mom raised him by herself after his father died when Jackson was just 2 years old. More than anything, he said she got him through this experience.
"It's been a long road," Jackson said. "I really couldn't have made it without her. She's my rock, She's motivated me throughout this whole experience."
He called Lincoln a second-chance university because he said no other schools accepted him out high school due to a low GPA. Now he plans to pursue a master's degree in student affairs at Florida Atlantic University, Georgia Southern University or Illinois University Carbondale.
As he accepted his degree, he pointed toward the sky as he wiped away a tear walking back to his seat, becoming the first person to graduate from college in his family. Half-an hour later, Jackson addressed his fellow students.
He told his classmates to be proud of the education they received and the intuition they earned it from.
"We're graduating from the ninth-eldest historically black college," he said. "A place where you come as a lump of coal and no one values your warts. But when Lincoln is done, you leave that diamond you were intended to be in this world."