Given the state of the economy and the job market they're entering, it probably would have been fitting if the members of Elizabethtown College's Class of 2012 graduated Saturday under dark storm clouds.

Instead, a brilliant sun shined on them from a cloudless sky, setting up an obvious metaphor for a recurring theme throughout the college's 109th commencement ceremony.

"We find ourselves in the midst of global economic uncertainty," James Shreiner, chairman of Elizabethtown's Board of Trustees, said to the 391 members of the graduating class.

"But within this uncertainty lies significant opportunity for you to contribute to the articulation of new ideas and concepts that can create a better world for your generation and generations to come."

Looking for opportunities, rather than dwelling on forecasts of gloomy prospects, is exactly how class President Amanda Knights, of Hampstead, Md., plans to move forward with her degree in social work.

"It's certainly scary," she said. "We put all this money into this education and we're supposed to be ready for any job, and then you get out there and there's just none available.

"But I think we can overcome any challenge. I think that's what college prepared us for, and I just look at it as another obstacle in life."

Knights plans to immediately pursue a master's degree in social work at Elizabethtown before diving into the job market.

"My goal is to work with inner-city youth," she said. "I really like working with the education system and I'm interested in policy, so I hope one day to maybe hold some type of government position and do some work with that."

Many advancements in society can be credited to graduates of liberal arts colleges, such as Elizabethtown, said commencement speaker Pauline Yu.

They push the world forward by asking questions and seeking answers, she said.

"You may be commencing life as a graduate, but you are not concluding your career as a student of life," Yu said. "Keep asking, keep questioning and keep climbing."

Yu is president of the American Council of Learned Societies.

As such, she leads an organization that "requires an appreciation for all forms of learning, and an understanding of the vital importance of the role the humanities serve in preserving our past and defining our future," said Susan Traverso, provost and senior vice president of Elizabethtown College.

Yu quoted former President Woodrow Wilson in describing to the graduates the importance of their college degrees and of colleges in general.

" 'The purpose of college ... was to prepare students for the grave duties of citizens and neighbors,' " she said.

Further, she quoted, " 'the man who has traveled in the realms of thought brings lessons home with him which make him grave and wise beyond his fellows."

What the world needs now, Yu told the graduates, is more educated people.

"You should prize what has become an increasingly endangered notion in this country," she said. "The ideal that a strong system of higher education serves the public good has faded and frayed.

"What dominates now instead is the conception that the prime value of education is private gain — better jobs, higher incomes, larger homes, faster cycles on the hamster wheel of affluence."

Yu urged the graduates "to fulfill the mission of this college — to be exemplars of how the life of learning you have enjoyed at Elizabethtown can be the foundation of sustained learning and service that benefits not just yourselves, but your families, your communities and your nation."

preilly@lnpnews.com