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Interdisciplinary Humanities Major Chosen to Deliver Spring 2025 Commencement Speech

A women with long blonde hair sitting next to a water fountain and she is wearing a dark green formal dress and a dark green graduation cap with a white tassel.
Lexi Lake, who is graduating with a B.A. in Interdisciplinary Humanities, will deliver the 2025 College of Arts & Letters’ undergraduate commencement speech.
(Photo by Trystan Guerrero)

Long before she applied to be the College of Arts & Letters’ 2025 commencement speaker, Lexi Lake had begun writing her speech.

“I want to shout from the rooftops how glad I am to be a Spartan,” she said. “I just have all this love and adoration for the university.”

Her speech, titled “What It Means to Go Green,” will reflect on the Class of 2025’s shared experiences and resilience.

“Wherever we go in life, whatever we do, we’re always going to have Michigan State,” Lake said. “We’re always going to hold that title of alum.”

Finding a Path

From Temperance, Michigan, Lake came to MSU uncertain of what she wanted to study, but confident that she had chosen a university that would allow her to explore and find her path.

“I wanted a place where I could really do anything,” she said. “I didn’t know exactly what major I wanted, but I knew I wanted a lot of options to pick from.”

She began her freshman year as a Graphic Design major, encouraged by her father to follow her creative instincts.

A woman poses on a stone staircase outside a building with arched wooden doors. She is wearing a brown and black patterned sweater, a skirt, black tights, and tall black boots.
Lexi Lake in front of Snyder-Phillips Hall at MSU.

“I like art, but I had never done a lot of digital art. It was very intimidating to me,” she said. “Starting in the studio art classes helped ease me into it.”

It wasn’t long before her coursework, and a conversation in a Snyder-Phillips Hall computer lab, introduced her to the Experience Architecture (XA) major, a program focused on designing experiences for people in digital environments.

“I really liked the sound of that — using design to make things better,” Lake said.

She shifted her major to Interdisciplinary Humanities, with XA, Graphic Design, and Professional and Public Writing as her three areas of focus.

“If I had known about this major from the get-go, I would have chosen it,” Lake said. “And I’d choose it over again.”

Lake takes pride in her unique degree and believes it helps her stand out in the job market.

“What I have is something very special and tailored,” she said. “It sets me apart above the rest, especially when I talk to people and they ask what interdisciplinary humanities is and I can give them my whole pitch.”

Learning by Doing

Outside the classroom, Lake further strengthened her skillset. She began interning for the College of Arts & Letters’ Excel Network her first year in college and has remained on the team throughout her time at MSU.

“I’m so grateful for my time with the Excel Network,” she said. “I really got to go to job boot camp. I got to learn how to be a professional, how to have professional relationships, communicate with my boss, make things, take criticism, take changes.”

Two women stand in front of a wall painted with the phrase, "Go Green Go White." Both have their arms raised in and are smiling. One wears a gray MSU College of Arts & Letters T-shirt, the other wears a green MSU sweatshirt.
Lexi Lake (left) and Kayla Wikaryasz (right) when they both worked as interns for the College of Arts & Letters’ Excel Network.

She also participated in Arts and Letters Projects, a micro-internship program that allowed her to take on short-term creative work. This included designing podcast graphics for “Talk About Teddy,” a podcast about Theodore Roosevelt, and doing an in-depth analysis of social media practices across 88 colleges in the United States, which she presented to the College of Arts & Letters Marketing and Communications Team.

Mentorship, too, shaped her experience. She credits her Excel Network supervisors Maggie Harris, Victoria Morris, and Dan Meier, with helping her find confidence, especially during times when her academic path was still coming into focus.

“They’ve seen me go through so many changes, not only as an intern but as a person,” she said. “They supported me every step of the way.”

“Wherever we go in life, whatever we do, we’re always going to have Michigan State.We’re always going to hold that title of alum.”

Lexi Lake

Support from faculty mentors also shaped her professional development. Professors like Liza Potts and Casey McArdle provided encouragement and space to grow.

“Liza Potts really helped me. Her class was when I started to realize I want to do more with social media. She was always so supportive of that,” Lake said. “She also allowed me to lean into my Formula One obsession and create a lot of things that were focused around F1.”

Of McArdle, Lake said: “I don’t know how he’s so positive all the time or where he gets that energy. Even if sometimes you’re not ready to be a student that day, he’s not letting you slack off.”

Living with Spartan Spirit

Lake’s time at MSU also included leadership roles in student organizations. She competed with the MSU Polo Team during her first two years and later served as social chair for the Ski and Snowboard Team at MSU, balancing busy race weekends with school and work.

A group of five women stand arm-in-arm at a ski slope. They are dressed in winter gear and helmets, with one woman wearing a ski race bib labeled “553” for USCSA. Snow-covered trees and a race course are visible in the background.
Lexi Lake (far left) and members of the Ski and Snowboard Team at MSU.

“It was very stressful, but it taught me a lot,” she said. “And I had such a great time.”

Through polo, she met Dodge, a horse she now leases and visits regularly.

“The club put him in my life,” she said. “I’m so grateful for that.”

Lake’s favorite memories from her time at MSU include late nights in Snyder-Phillips, weekends with friends in West Circle, and attending campus sporting events.

“I bleed green,” she said. “I just love this school so much.”

A smiling woman in an MSU College of Arts & Letters T-shirt poses next to Sparty, the Michigan State University mascot. They are standing inside a campus building with informational tables and green Spartan banners in the background.
A woman stands in front of a Michigan State Athletics backdrop, wearing a green MSU Spartans football jersey and cap. She is holding a white football helmet with a green Spartan logo and smiling.
Lexi Lake says she “bleeds green” and that she “loves this school so much.”

Lake also notes that in moments of hardship, the MSU community was just as present, especially in the wake of the 2023 campus shooting.

“I’ll never forget coming back to school and the Red Cedar was just lined with people. There were so many people there to show their support and to give out free hugs and dog pets and food and flowers,” she said. “During that bad time, we came together as a community, supported each other, and leaned on each other.”

A Speech Years in the Making

Lake’s desire to deliver the College of Arts & Letters commencement speech began around the time she started to write in earnest, often as a way to process the emotional weight of the pandemic, the pressure of her responsibilities, and the grief that followed the 2023 campus shooting.

A woman wearing a black tank top and a black baseball cap with a "Dana 44" logo takes a close-up selfie with a chestnut-colored horse. They are standing outdoors under a cloudy sky. The woman is smiling, and the horse has a white blaze down its face.
Lexi Lake and Dodge, a horse she met as a member of the MSU Polo Team and who she now leases and visits regularly.

“I started writing every time I had these intense emotions,” she said. “And oftentimes the things I wrote about were the people I loved, the experiences I had, and how much I loved Michigan State. I had all this love and adoration for the university, and I realized I wanted to share this with people. I wanted to talk about my time here.”

When the commencement speaker application opened, she already had a rough draft of the speech she’d been working on for over a year. And when she found out she was selected, she was beyond excited.

“I legitimately screamed out loud. I was so excited to find out that I had been chosen,” said Lake, adding that she is “nervously excited for commencement” and “most of all, I’m excited because I feel like this will be a nice big bow that I’m putting on my time at MSU. It’s the perfect way to close out my time spent at a school that has given me so much, because I can give a little bit back to it.”

Looking Ahead

Woman with long blonde hair wearing a green dress and green MSU graduation gown and holding a graduation cap that says: "I can do hard things."
Lexi Lake
(Photo by Trystan Guerrero)

A passionate Formula 1, IndyCar, and all-around motorsport fan, Lake hopes to channel her creative energy into a career in motorsport media after graduation. She is especially drawn to the idea of working with F1 Academy, the women’s development series launched to create more opportunities for female drivers in a male-dominated sport.

“I so wholeheartedly believe in that mission,” she said. “I would love to bring more attention to it, get some eyes on it, and get some people supporting women in motorsports. I just need to get my foot in the door. I’d love to see where it goes.”

MSU’s College of Arts & Letters commencement ceremony is Sunday, May 4, at 8:30 a.m. at the Breslin Student Events Center. For more information on MSU’s commencement ceremonies, including a link to the ceremony livestreams, visit the MSU Commencement website.

By Austin Curtis

Categories: News / Student