This year's undergraduate commencement speaker promises to be a lot more inspirational and less political.

At the request of MSU President Lou Anna K. Simon, poet Maya Angelou has agreed to see MSU's graduating class off into the wide world. Simon personally invited the poet, author, historian, songwriter, playwright, dancer, stage and screen producer, director, performer, singer and civil rights activist to help students cap off their years of studies at MSU and make some sense of what has transpired during that time.

If anyone seems like a good bet to get this job done, it is the St. Louis-born artist who has been called upon by the likes of Martin Luther King Jr. and former President Bill Clinton to lend her service to their causes.

With this being Simon's first year as president, one can't help but notice that the academics-focused president's choice of speakers contrasts with former MSU President M. Peter McPherson's choices. In prior years, McPherson used connections to call upon Vice President Dick Cheney in 2002, Gov. Jennifer Granholm in 2003 and, most recently, Former National Security Adviser (now U.S. Secretary of State) Condoleezza Rice.

But, some of these people were not excellent speakers to place in front of graduating college students. Rice's appearance, for example, was somewhat overshadowed by the protests of activist groups.

This year, when students enter Breslin Center at 1 p.m. on May 6, it will not be to hear a politician. The words that are supposed to inspire them to go out and make a life for themselves will not come from those who've had a hand in letting the U.S. economy decline or Michigan's unemployment become the worst in the nation.

Instead, they will be treated to a woman who King once asked to coordinate the Southern Christian Leadership Conference. They'll witness the same fiery spirit Clinton asked to ignite the nation at his first inauguration in 1993. The words they hear will have been written by a woman nominated for a Pulitzer Prize. They'll be spoken by a Tony Award nominee.

Had McPherson still been president, undergraduates might have had to suffer through the observations of U.S. House Majority Leader Tom DeLay or some similarly corrupt and boring Washington politician. California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger, Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld and CNN anchor Wolf Blitzer also strike us as commencement candidates McPherson might have been attracted to.

This year, there are no such worries.

Expect something spectacular from Angelou. Something moving and memorable. Expect someone who will have the muse to epitomize the odyssey that is the college experience. Graduating or not, this is an event no student should miss.