Langhorne native and George School graduate Rishi Madnani said in his commencement speech at Bates College that he discovered a “big part of who I am” at the prestigious liberal arts college in Maine.

All throughout the country, the college experience of this year’s graduates was perhaps upended the most of any class of students. Being sent home in March of his first year on campus, Madnani, the son of immigrants from India, had to alter his expectations.

“I think we lost ‘tangential’ friendships,” he said of the pandemic’s impact on his freshman year. “But those relationships have made a comeback in the last two years.”

The biochemistry major, whose goal is to become a physician and scientist, said that he was “academically locked in” by his sophomore year.

“(I was) really forced to confront the important questions,” he said. “What do I want to do? What calls me? Do I want to go into acting? Do I want to go into politics? What do I want to do? And then biochemistry called my name. And I just got swept away.”

Madnani lauded the value of interdisciplinary thinking at Bates College.

“You have your major, but you can pretty much take anything and be welcomed with open arms, even if you are a significant outlier, for lack of a better word,” he said. “There are classes where you don’t meet the prerequisites, but sometimes all it takes is an email to the professor saying, “I’m very interested for these reasons. I think I can do well because of this.” And professors will often meet you where you are. If you want to learn the material and you’re excited about it, they’re excited to have you. And that mutual excitement is what I love about Bates.”

Read more about Rishi Madnani from Bates College.

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Before graduating from Bates College, seniors posed for slow-motion video portraits.