Thank you, Dr. Samhat, and greetings and congratulations to members of the class of 2022 and all of your family members and special guests, as well as to the golden Class of 1972, your spouses and special guests, and others who are colleagues or other friends from the greater Wofford family.
I come to you this morning already keenly aware of at least one universal truth: I know that you all really wanted Craig Melvin to be your Commencement speaker. Right about now, so do I! Since we are all starting this speech with some level of disappointment — and you are stuck with this old guy… a lot closer to being in the Class of 1972 than 2022 — I will try to offer a few insights and recommendations that, perhaps, can take you from where you’re sitting in the Class of 2022 section to where hopefully you will be sitting fifty years from now in 2072! Standing here I am reminded of legendary history professor Lewis P. Jones, who was a wise and beloved Wofford fixture for much of the twentieth century. Every year at commencement time, Dr. Jones would muse that we hold this ceremony at the wrong time…he said that it was fine to send you on your way at the end of four years, but that we should wait maybe twenty or twenty-five years to confer degrees, to judge and see if you really did learn anything! Dr. Jones may have been right.
Certainly, getting from here (points at Class of 2022) to there (points to Class of 2072) will involve lots of choices. And as we’ve learned over the past few years, it also takes some luck.
I wish we could all agree now never to allow another pandemic, but that is, unfortunately, out of our control. Four of the eight semesters that most of you have been enrolled at Wofford were affected by pandemic conditions that altered whatever “normal Wofford” might have been. You deserve commendation on many fronts, but none more so than for having persevered and persisted through these unprecedented times. I wish we could erase COVID-19 from our memories, but what we all experienced should serve as a reminder about the future: expect the unexpected and try to build as much flexibility into your lives as you possibly can — I hope you’ve all added flexibility and adaptability as a line on your resumes — and I have no doubt that your futures are bright. And, be assured…I will be cheering for you … from my retirement beach chair at Pawleys Island!
So, Class of 2022, how do you get from here to there (points at the Class of 1972 again)? What does that look like?
The customary commencement speech, and there will be thousands of them in this season, usually offers advice to graduates about having made it, having earned your degree, having undergone four years of growth and transformation filled with all of the requisite experiences that college students have… virtually all of the speeches will include references to spreading your wings and flying… leaping out of the nest or being pushed over the edge… soaring toward a future filled with rainbows and unicorns. With that in mind, don’t let the irony of today’s speaker be lost on you… I am one who never really flew the coop, spread my wings or executed a perfect double summersault over the edge of the nest… or out of the Wofford “bubble” as it is called.
In a few weeks, I will retire after 45 years as a member of Wofford’s administration. Count my four years as a student immediately prior, and I have been at Wofford for almost half a century… my entire professional career has been in this place. I know at least a few of you are joining Wofford for work, and while I might not recommend sticking around in one place for 45 years, I know it can work, and I am confident the college would be in good hands if you did. And in my case, while I didn’t start with the goal of spending a 45-year career at Wofford, things worked out well for me. I have served alongside three wonderful presidents — Joe Lesesne, Bernie Dunlap and Nayef Samhat — and countless incredible colleagues. The Wofford that has been built over these four and half decades is immeasurably stronger, healthier, more inclusive, and more gorgeous than when I was here as a student in the 1970s. Wofford is poised for even greater days ahead, and for that, I am grateful and energized — not enough to postpone retirement, but, again, I’ll be cheering for all of you from … my beach chair on Pawleys Island!
My career — from admission to fundraising to administration — has had one overarching theme: the work of building relationships and tending to those relationships in order to help people — my colleagues, our students, the college in general — in making connections. Relationships and connections are the currency in which I have made my trade. And the time in this place that we all love — Wofford College — has provided me with the opportunity to accumulate a huge savings account worth of relationships and connections that should make even Jeff Bezos envious!
Having been around here for so long I think proves that I must be pretty good at sticking with something. We all know that change is the only constant in the world. I absolutely know that to be true, but I am also here to make a plea for continuity, loyalty, and commitment. As you graduates move into the world of work, and certainly many of you will have careers and jobs making and doing things that haven’t even been created yet, just know that loyalty and commitment are virtues that stand the test of time.
For me, some examples of things that are worth it from the standpoint of loyalty and commitment:
Marriage: my long-suffering wife, Cyndi, and I began as newly introduced friends when we were 13 years old and in a few weeks will celebrate 42 years of married life. She has experienced knowing that I was also married to Wofford for all of that time, too. Trust me, having a best friend, soulmate, confidant, and committed partner to travel life’s journey with is something to be cherished and nurtured!
Friends are another example of things to cherish and to stick with. Class of 2022, if you only hear one thing I say today, please hear this: your college friends are most likely your best friends over a lifetime. I bet these folks in the class of 1972 will agree. But friendships are challenging to maintain over a span of years, and you need to work at it to keep these friends in your circle… now you all are headed for travel, for graduate and professional school, to the military, to new jobs in far-flung places around the world… thanks to texting, facetime, and social media, staying connected is at least easier than it used to be, but you still have to work at it, because life is inevitably going to intervene… many of you will marry, start families, change careers and relocate several times, and the next thing you know, five or ten or fifteen years will have passed.
In the audience today is Jim Hackney, whom I met on our first day as first-year students in 1973, and we have been close friends ever since through thick and thin. For me, thanks to Wofford and to that sense of commitment and loyalty, I still have Jim in my life and have actually been able to have friends in every class since then, some now who are the younger siblings, children… and even grandchildren of the first generation of Wofford friends I started with! And remember, too, that your faculty and staff mentors also want to be considered friends for life with whom you stay connected.
Community…Wofford alumni have been community leaders since the college was founded. Name a community, especially one within about 500 miles of Spartanburg, and I can almost surely name a Wofford person there who is making a difference for the people of that community. And every community needs your engagement — the kind of participation and support that smart, caring, problem-solving people who share the Wofford experience can provide. So, get involved… give of yourself and your resources… use that Wofford degree… wherever you land in the world.
Church… The concept of “church” is certainly different in 2022 than it was when I graduated, even different than it was a decade ago, but church is important to me personally. First Presbyterian in this city is where I have chosen to belong and grow. I won’t preach any further, but I will say that a community of faith is and can be a very meaningful source of support, friendship and help in dealing with the challenges we inevitably face.
And college… This is where you and I “found our people”…we must embrace their quirks and differences, and do what we can to pay it forward for the next generation of Wofford students and the next. Stay connected to one another, but to your college, too… Wofford can help you stay connected to your friends. Plan on finding Wofford alumni in your cities and towns, attend gatherings of alumni, and return often to your alma mater.
I’d like to point out in my defense — and in the defense of others for whom commitment is a way of life — that sticking with something does not mean you aren’t growing… remembering again that change is a constant, you will grow within these fundamental life structures. Building and tending to relationships, making strong connections, and finding that sticking to the things that matter works well when done in concert.
Are those concepts the secret to success, however success might be defined? Just on their own, probably not… I well remember 50-year Wofford Trustee Roger Milliken, who was the unofficial architect of the modern Wofford campus and a giant in its history, who amassed a huge personal fortune and built a largely unrivaled business empire, was often asked by Wofford students what his secret to success was. Without hesitation, Mr. Milliken would smile and say, “Well, you might be surprised, but it can be boiled down to two four-letter words… hard work.” I think he was right.
As I was working on the points for this speech, a dear friend and colleague suggested that I take a look at a book entitled the road to character by New York times columnist and author David Brooks, one of the more thoughtful social commentators in the country today. In the book, brooks profiles nine individuals — some famous in history and some not-so-famous — who present remarkable examples of persons for whom doing what was right and just always took priority over everything else. Through these exemplary people, brooks seeks to show the difference between what he calls the “resume’ virtues” and the “eulogy virtues”, the former being the things we lift up to “sell” ourselves, with the latter being the things that really matter about a person over the span of a lifetime: do they possess humility, compassion, trustworthiness… what is it that really makes up the persons we are bringing to the roles we fill… I urge you members of the Class of 2022 to spend some of the next fifty years concentrating on those eulogy virtues we all seek — being brave, honest, kind and faithful, as Brooks cites them, while standing on the principles of continuity, loyalty and commitment, and I am confident that the graduating Class of 2072 will be cheering loudly for you on your 50th reunion! Just as you’ll be cheering for them and the fresh start that they’re about to undertake…
I can see it now, even though I will have graduated from my beach chair!
So, here’s to you, Class of 2022… we’re all cheering for you!