Ellen Foley
Deborah Cureton, dean and CEO of the University of Wisconsin-Richland in Richland Center, invited me to give the commencement address May 11 to the school's 70 or so graduates.
It was a thrill to spend some time with the dedicated faculty at this intimate campus about an hour and a half drive west of Madison and to get to know the stories of the hardworking students, most of whom hail from the Richland Center area and many of whom will attend four-year campuses of the university next year.
I understand that a DVD version of my speech will be coming out next week. For those of you patient enough to read the full speech, you'll understand why that might be rather entertaining.
Here's your editor in her multimedia splendor:
Commencement Address
University of Wisconsin-Richland
It is such a treat for me to drive through the rolling hills of Wisconsin to Richland Center.
I couldn't help pondering on the drive from Madison the very words that name your school and your town: RICH LAND.
I am humbled to have been asked to share a bit of commencement wisdom with the graduates of such a magical place
You are some of our best and our brightest. Many of you are the first person in your family to graduate from college. And we know that it hasn't been an easy pull for most of you.
I sit on an interesting perch as an editor of a newspaper who is becoming the editor of a newspaper AND a website.
Technology is changing my work life dramatically. And because I realize that your lives are about to change dramatically, I feel surprisingly qualified to share with you a few observations about what the world needs from the graduates of this fine school.
You are blessed with at least two great gifts that are going to propel you into leadership roles ---- not only in your home communities --- but most likely in the world.
These two gifts are tools and timing.
We'll take timing first.
Congratulations on choosing the best time since the year 2000 to be looking for a job. The economy is booming for many industries. The stock market keeps setting record highs. There are a lot of business moguls with lots of cash investing in very interesting corners of American life.
A recent article in the Wisconsin State Journal (which you can also see on madison.com/wsj), noted that the hiring of college grads will increase almost 20 percent this year from 2006. That's a 20 percent increase in just one year. The big winners are those studying engineering, business, health care and computer-related fields.
However, recruiters told the State Journal that the job-seekers who will command the highest salaries and the best jobs have one distinguishing trait: They are well rounded.
Employers are looking for graduates who have had jobs during school, who can communicate, who have leadership potential and who can work on a team.
In short, they are looking for the kinds of students who come from this Rich Land.
In addition to your school work, your dean tells me that you have been athletes, newspaper editors, student government leaders, campus ambassadors, musicians, thespians, tutors, work-study students, Road Ralley winners (AND LOSERS. Sorry about that) active members of various clubs ---- and much more.
You are exactly what the nation's employers and universities are looking for.
You also have an historic demographic shift going for you. There are many Baby Boomers, like me, and a lot fewer of you. There will be many more jobs than job seekers in the coming years as the Boomers retire. If you play this right, you will be in the driver's seat when you go to find a job.
So let's move to gift, No. 2.
Tools.
You are THE multimedia generation. You have amazing tools. You watch movies at home via DVDs or TIVOs. And you do this ---- cuddling your laptops so you can IM your friends and keep your eye on the text messages coming in on your cell phones. (Laughter)
I have observed this at my own home.
Most likely every one of you has a cell phone that you will use to take photos tonight. Some of you may even be recording me right now with your Ipods.
Recently a professor at the Madison campus suggested the next wave of change will involve nanotechnology in the wallpaper of our homes. It will sit there quietly monitoring our vital signs ready to call our physicians if we need to go to the emergency room. This astonishes me!
Very soon OUR WALLPAPER IS GOING TO BE CALLING OUR DOCTORS!!!
Yes, I see you're laughing, but I also know that you are a bit relieved, because you don't want to be the ones coming by to check mom's blood pressure every day.
Let the wallpaper do it!
My point here is that the tools will continue to evolve exponentially and in another year or perhaps two, the job you have trained for or the topic you are preparing to study at your next college will be changing and you will need to be nimble enough to change with it. You will need to create the next tool. You will need to build on the technology.
With these two gifts come almost unfathomable challenges. Author Thomas Friedman of the New York Times in his recent bestseller told us that our world is flat. Routine jobs, such as customer service call centers, will be offshored to places, such as India, where the cost is lower and the quality may be better.
You will need to stay one step ahead of these complicated global changes, including the warming of the planet.
Many of you are saddled with debt from student loans. We worry about how you will build a life when starter homes in places like Madison cost $200,000 and health care benefits take increasingly larger bites out of paychecks.
You are coming of age at time of random violence, from Oklahoma City to Columbine to 9/11 to Virginia Tech. These horrific events will define the rest of your lives and keep you ever vigilant.
We are a nation at war, as your colleague Cody can attest to. We look to your leadership so that this conflict will come to an end.
We will look to your skills of diplomacy so our nation can resolve other international tensions without resorting to warfare and the deaths of our brave soldiers.
Yes, you are a lucky group but you will need to use your gifts wisely.
This, of course, is why your administrators invited ME to give this commencement speech.
I have the secret to success.
And I will give you that secret in just one minute after I explain to you how hard this is. You see, the problem with commencement addresses is that no one ever remembers what the speaker says.
I asked our State Journal researchers to help me remember the details of my own commencement from the University of Wisconsin in Madison in 1974. I was pretty sure it involved Sen. George McGovern and the reading of a poem.
Not only was George McGovern NOT the commencement speaker but there was no poem. (Laughter.)
Our speaker was then-Lt. Gov. Marty Schreiber and he spoke to us passionately about avoiding another Watergate scandal. You'd think I'd remember that.
So graduates, listen up. This is the only thing we expect you to remember after you have long forgotten Ellen Foley or mixed her up with Hillary Clinton. (Hoots.)
If you remember nothing else, remember THIS simple secret to success:
Are you ready?
WALK ON THE SUNNY SIDE OF THE STREET.
Walking on the sunny side of the street is a choice you will have to make every day of your life from now on. And I want to emphasize that word "Choice". It is a daily job.
It is hard work to choose the sunny side.
I am not going to go on and on about this because it's getting late, and we all know you are NOT going to remember much of what I just said. So I'm going to try something that I hope will embed this secret of survival into your reptilian brains. And I'm going to use one of those multimedia tools I referred to --- albeit a low tech one.
I'm going to sing a little song for you.
A capella.
This should be memorable.
I have never done this before in public in my entire life.
GRAB YOUR COAT AND GET YOUR HAT
LEAVE YOUR WORRIES ON THE DOORSTEP
LIFE CAN BE SO SWEET
ON THE SUNNY SIDE OF THE STREET
CAN'T YOU HEAR THE PITTER PAT
AND THAT HAPPY TUNE IS YOUR STEP
LIFE CAN BE COMPLETE
ON THE SUNNY SIDE OF THE STREET
I USED TO WALK IN THE SHADE
WITH MY BLUES ON PARADE
BUT I'M NOT AFRAID
THIS ROVER'S CROSSED OVER
YOU'LL BE RICH AS ROCKEFELLER
GOLD DUST AT YOUR FEET
ON THE SUNNY
ON THE SUNNY
ON THE SUNNY SIDE OF THE STREET.
Congratulations, graduates.
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