About 300 of the 3,000-member class showed up, many with their grown children in tow, not to mention unfinished business.

“That was a big deal,” Dr. Marcia Wells Avery, one of three black nursing students in the class of 1970, said of her canceled graduation. “It was worse for the parents and the grandparents, many of whom are dead now and were robbed of that opportunity to see their child march across that stage.”

“My father vowed that B.U. would never get a penny from him,” added Dr. Avery, who is now a nursing professor at Northwestern State University in Louisiana.

Still, Dr. Avery was enjoying the weekend. She decided to drop by the bookstore and “buy up all the B.U. paraphernalia” she could find. She said she would even consider making a future donation to the school.

And by the end of the ceremonies on Sunday, she was beaming. “It’s O.K.,” she said. “I feel complete.”

Although officials avoided any mention of fund-raising during the weekend, many class members assumed that this was one of the university’s long-term goals as it sought to strengthen its bonds with this class, many of them professionals, many on the verge of retirement.

Scott Nichols, the university’s chief fund-raiser, said that “there is no plan afterward to swoop in.” However, he added: “These students had this strange moment in time. Why not treat them nicely? In a fund-raising sense, you never go wrong treating people nicely and there’s always payback, but we have no solicitation strategy.”