Palau President Delivers La Sierra Graduation Address

Surangel S. Whipps, Jr., was awarded an honorary doctorate.

June 16, 2025 | La Sierra, California, United STates, Darla Martin Tucker, La Sierra University, and Adventist Review

On Sunday, June 15, about 380 graduates of La Sierra University in Riverside, California, United States, embarked on the next phase of their life’s journey with insight and counsel from the leader of the Republic of Palau, a nation of Micronesia in the western Pacific Ocean.

Surangel S. Whipps, Jr., Palau’s president, delivered a commencement address titled “Navigating the Future, Knowing God Is in Control” for the class of 2025 Conferring of Degrees ceremony. The culminating graduation event took place at 8:00 a.m. on Founders’ Green on the university’s campus, completing a weekend of commencement events.

In recognition of his leadership and commitment to public service, Whipps also received an honorary Doctor of Laws (LL.D.) from the university, presented by La Sierra president Christon Arthur, who is overseeing his first commencement since taking the leading role at La Sierra on July 1, 2024.

Whipps’ daughter, Moded Samantha Surangel, is graduating magna cum laude with a degree in political economy and accounting from the Zapara School of Business. She received an award from the school on June 3 for 2025 Outstanding Senior for Accounting, Economics, and Finance.

Whipps, a Seventh-day Adventist, is the tenth president of the Republic of Palau, a country of about 340 islands, islets, and atolls. Until 1994 Palau operated under the Trust Territory of the Pacific Islands (TTPI), previously administered by the United States on behalf of the United Nations. Whipps is a former two-term senator who served in the Eighth and Ninth Palau National Congresses before running for the presidency in 2016. He currently serves in the Twelfth Constitutional Government after being reelected for a second term in the general election held on November 5, 2024. He first assumed the presidency in January 2021.

Prior to his presidency, Whipps served as chief executive officer of Surangel & Sons Company, transforming it from a small retail store into a diversified enterprise employing more than 600 people. He operates from a platform that envisions an improved quality of life for Palauans, with efforts aligned under the slogan “Palauan People First,” which focuses on a commitment to bring the welfare of Palauan peoples to the forefront. He has prioritized public health and economic recovery in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic and has focused on restoring the tourism sector, protecting the environment, and bringing international attention to the existential threats posed by climate change and ocean pollution. He also led efforts to diversify Palau’s economy through technology and negotiated key provisions of the economic assistance component of the Compacts of Free Association with the United States.

His administration is expanding Palau’s tourism markets, and major capital improvement projects include the construction and renovation of educational facilities, the development of a new national hospital, completion of a modern Division of Corrections facility, construction of a new fishing port, and enhancements to Palau’s solar energy storage capacity to provide more reliable clean energy.

Whipps holds a bachelor’s degree in business administration with a focus on economics from Andrews University in Michigan, United States, a Seventh-day Adventist institution, and an M.B.A. from the Anderson School of Management at the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA), United States. He and his wife, Valerie Esang Remengesau, have four children.

The original version of this story was posted by La Sierra University.