Commencement 2004

Honorary Degree Citation: Sr. Ann Kendrick, SND '66

"We are inheritors of a revolution." Such was the sense of destiny that Trinity's Class of 1966 proclaimed in the opening pages of their yearbook. Their words proved prophetic. The Class of '66 roster reads like a who's who of women who led the revolution during the last four decades: corporate leaders, academic stars, diplomats, lawyers, teachers, journalists, many becoming the "first woman" along the way.

This astoundingly talented group of Trinity Women wisely chose as their class president a classmate whose energy and drive set the pace: Ann Kendrick, Sister of Notre Dame, co-founder of the Farmworker Ministry in Apopka, Florida.

Ann Kendrick's leadership was clear from her first days at Trinity when this native of Syracuse, New York took on class leadership positions, joined numerous student activities on campus, and tutored at the Junior Village project in Washington. Smart and popular, Ann's friends were convinced that she would surely shatter many glass ceilings on her way up the leadership ladder.

But Ann's journey to the revolution took a sharp turn in an unexpected direction when she spent the summer of her junior year in Honduras and experienced first-hand the poverty and misery of families in Central America. With her passion to work for social change inflamed by that experience, Ann joined the Sisters of Notre Dame de Namur whose worldwide ministries to women, children and the poor emanated from their congregational commitment to action for justice.

Ann soon found her life's ministry on the dusty back roads and sun-baked fields of Apopka, Florida where truckloads of migrant workers pick the cabbages and carrots and strawberries and ferns that fill countless American tables. The work is back-breaking and takes a physical toll. Before Ann and other SNDs founded the Farmworker Ministry, the laborers had no health services available to them, and their children had no schools. The workers lived in appalling conditions, earning low wages with no benefits.

Today, thanks to the revolution that Ann and the Sisters of Notre Dame accomplished in Apopka, the farmworkers and their families have a network of well-staffed health clinics, a credit union to protect their hard-earned wages, educational and family services, and perhaps most important, advocacy for policy change.

In September 2003, as she led a march for change in immigration laws, Ann told the marchers, "If we don't like what is happening in this country, it is up to us to make a difference." (quoted on newshaiti.com) Sister Ann Kendrick, SND, is the woman of the revolution, the person described in the 1966 Trinilogue as "…a Christian of the diaspora whose responsibility is for all people and whose service is for all people…"

For her courage to lead the revolution, for her service to countless children and families in the agricultural community of Apopka, for her passion for justice emulating the spirit of Julie Billiart and charism of the Sisters of Notre Dame de Namur, Trinity College is pleased to bestow upon Ann Kendrick, SND, Class of 1966, the degree of Doctor of Laws, honoris causa.