Commencement
Faith Ireland Commencement Speech
June 16, 2000
YOUR GIFT, FLEXIBILITY and STRENGTH
By Justice Faith Ireland
In 1956, when I was in the eighth grade, my Dad dropped me at school one morning, especially early. I was glad it was so early because then no one would see the beater that my dad drove and I wouldn’t be embarrassed if the front door fell off as I was getting out, as it sometimes did. I went to Puget Sound Jr. High, which was painted prison green and where, because of the baby boom, we double shifted. I went down to the basement past the air raid shelter to a drab office where my counselor would tell me my student placement scores. After the meeting I went to the girls room, tears starting in my eyes and the words "NOT COLLEGE MATERIAL" echoing in my ears. I overcame the prediction tests, but it wasn’t easy. As I look back there was also a gift in it. I leaned never to believe someone who tells you that you can’t do something. I know that like me, many of you overcame the odds to be where you are today.
When I graduated from high school forty years ago a community college would have been wonderful – but none existed. There were some vocational technical schools and some junior colleges, but none in my area.
I was lucky to get admitted to the University of Washington and started college with more than 30,000 students and very little confidence. A year after I started the University, Highline Community College was built and Edmonds Community College followed in 1967. But that doesn’t mean I never attended community college. After I had practiced law for seven years I decided get a masters degree in Tax. To get that degree I needed two prerequisite undergraduate accounting courses. So, pushing 40 years of age with a B.A. and a J. D. already under my belt, I headed for my nearest community college for two quarters of night school in accounting. I was a part of the growing movement to which you all belong, lifelong learning. With graduates tonight from age 17-73, we see that trend has blossomed into a full-scale revolution.
The statistics tell me that slightly more of you are college transfers than those of you who have completed your profession technical degrees and who will be hitting the streets to seek your career. How does one select a career these days that won’t be obsolete before the ink is dry on the diploma?
In history one came to a job by birth, whether king, serf or merchant. People fled to the New World to have freedom of choice in thought and action. The agrarian economy again fostered the father-to-son tradition of determining employment. Then the industrial revolution moved men from the farm to factory where employment was available to skilled workers, leading to the rise of labor unions. Those who labored often wanted a better life for their sons and daughters and saw education as the key. World War II with its G.I. benefits helped create an educated middle class and the rise of engineering, architecture and other professions. Through education, the conventional wisdom said, one could plan for a successful career for a lifetime. The demise of the industrial age and the advent of the spiraling information age has dashed such easy assumptions. Computers, robotics and other technology led to downsizing. Career changes became commonplace. The 90’s saw corporations and even government going lean, shopping for consultants, temps or perma-temps and the part-timing of the workforce. The McJob without benefits or mutual loyalty became commonplace. Fortunately the booming economy also led to near full-employment. As the workforce tightened, changing jobs was the means to raise your salary.
The Internet and e-commerce at the turn of the century finds entepreneurship was on the rise again. Puget Sound was at the epicenter of the IPO furor helping to account for a reported 60,000 millionaires in the Seattle area.
The notion of "career" now sounds mildly quaint. Even the notion of "job" is challenged. Bioengineering, genetics, and nanotechnology will spawn vocations we haven’t yet imagined. Free-lancing is cachet. It is a time of unparalleled opportunity and yet it all seems so shaky, so risky.
Here’s where your special gifts come in.
You, because you are graduating today from Edmonds Community College will bring two special gifts to your next learning institution or your job. The first gift is flexibility. Your educational institution represents the epitome of flexibility where students with the responsibility of work, parenting, caring for elders also excel at learning. Edmonds has always been a leader in visioning its students needs, whether the running start program for college course ready high school students, the new weekend college begun last year, or the new e-college, Washington Online, linking the curricula of all the state’s community colleges. Innovative studies such as 3-D animation and medical paralegal will help students prepare for those emerging fields in technology and bioengineering. You represent a rich diversity of race and ethnic background, which has prepared for our multi-cultural workforce.
The second gift you will bestow is strength. Perhaps some of you have lived the pampered life and had this diploma handed to you on a silver platter, without sacrifice. If so, you are not the lucky ones. The lucky ones are those of you who have scratched, scraped and clawed to get this degree; juggling the responsibilities, fighting for study time, stretching the dollar to the breaking point. The strength, courage and tenacity you have expended to get here, is the gift graduate course you don’t get credits for, but which will let you meet the challenges as you move on because you know you can do whatever comes your way.
The sport of powerlifting requires both flexibility and strength. So does being an effective parent, a true friend, and a good citizen. When I visited the campus a few weeks ago to prepare for this address, I saw that flexibility and strength reflected in your student speakers. Lawrene Lee, who gave up the comfort of a banking career to pursue a dream, the pursuit of justice. Bina Bogati, says she is here in school because she is "her brother’s investment". She will return to her home in Nepal for a career in technology, but her dream is to establish a school for needy children who would otherwise have no education.
That flexibility and strength I also saw reflected in the two high school completion students I met. Getting married and being a mom was the most Stephanie Dixon’s family hoped for her. She dropped out and married, but became a single mom with a four-year-old. Fortunately, Stephanie has received a special gift here at Edmonds. She has found her intelligence. A mediocre student in high school, here at Edmonds she excels.
The second high school completion student, Tom Lawson, had parents who harped on him about the importance of an education. Unfortunately, Tom wasn’t listening and left school two credits shy of his high school diploma. Tom, father of a six-year-old daughter, received a special gift from Edmonds in addition to his academics. He has developed positive discipline skills from Edmond’s parenting classes and thinks he’s a better dad for it.
I know the stories of these four students are multiplied by the dozens of you graduating today. Take that flexibility and strength into your new adventures and the future is yours. Congratulations and more power to you.
