Today is a special day for our graduates, 3,600 strong. This is your day. The day you've been working so hard to get to, and I want to be the first to say congratulations.
But I also want to make sure that we understand that there isn't one of you here that's been able to do this by yourselves. So, as you enjoy this day, and we will talk about the celebration that you need and deserve to have, I want you to reflect on people that are here in this sold-out Schottenstein auditorium. Your parents, your loved ones, your brothers, your sisters, your spouses, your partners, your classmates, some of the staff that we just mentioned, and certainly the world-class best faculty members that I know of any institution in the United States.
So, before we get started, I'm going to ask the class of 2025 to please stand up. And let's give a round of applause to everybody that came here for you today.
Now, we call this the autumn commencement. Now that's kind of funny because it isn't autumn anymore. Today is the first day of winter. It's the winter solstice.
And as many of us know, it's the shortest amount of daylight in the Northern Hemisphere. But we also know in many cultures, winter solstice, if you look at the Latin meaning of solstice, it means sun on the pause or being withheld. It's often seen as a moment of reinvigoration for spiritual regrowth. And how appropriate is it that we have winter solstice, one of the latest times we've had in a graduation or commencement ceremony here at Ohio State, on this commencement.
And the word “commencement” itself is really not an end. For as hard as you've worked for your degrees, this is really a day of beginning. As we look across the entire United States where ceremonies like this are happening at thousands and thousands of colleges and universities, students just like yourselves are telling us that they're concerned. This is a period in our nation's history and world history where there's a lot of volatility. There's a lot of unknown. Many of you here today have a good idea of what's in your future.
You know, there's maybe a job waiting for you, maybe higher education, maybe going into military service, serving for something that's for the greater good, but for a lot of you, there's still a lot of unknown. And with that sometimes comes fear.
So, the first thing I want to tell you is, there's some things that you should take stock in today, besides this moment of celebration for what you have achieved. Because after today, you will leave here with a diploma, a diploma that you earned. And what is unique to Ohio State is every one of you will walk the stage and get your diploma with your name on it. One of the wonderful traditions that we have here. But bigger than that is what you've learned here in your journey. The world-class education that you've received, your ability to think critically for yourselves and go on and face that unknown. You are the future of not just what will happen here in the state of Ohio, but for our nation and for our world.
Now, I've been in the professional community for 45 years. I've had the privilege of wearing the cloth of our nation as a Naval Aviator, as a Carrier Captain, and other things dealing with the United States Navy, but maybe more importantly, leading in higher education now for 12 years. And I'll tell you, I've learned a few things along the way, and I'd like to just spend a couple of minutes talking about some things that I know.
The first is, no matter what you think you're going to be doing in your life, no matter how well you have it planned out, I promise you, to each and every one of you that's graduating today, your life's going to go a little bit differently. I can tell you in my own journey, I've had many doors closed on me. I've had many failures, but when a door closed and another one opened up, for whatever reason, I was welcoming and willing to go through that door and things somehow turned out right.
I would have never in my wildest imagination as a small kid growing up in Rhode Island ever think that I could be in front of this 18,000-crowd standing here as your 17th president at The Ohio State University. This could never have happened. These things will happen to you, but don't be afraid to take that other door when it opens. I've also had the chance to observe in just about every scenario from high-end combat to aviation training and education, even in higher education, what it takes to be successful in life. And I'm going to give you three, what I call behavioral principles, some things that I have observed that if you can take these things into your life, I promise you, you will not only be successful, you'll change the entire trajectory of your life.
Now, as we take a step back and look at what's happening in our nation right now, the American public has lost faith in just about every large institution, whether it be the government, elected leaders, whether it be medicine, religion, even higher education, even the military. And why is that? Why is that? Well, maybe it's because we haven't been able to look ourselves in the mirror and speak to what we have to change to regain the trust, and it can happen starting with the Class of 2025. So, if you do these three things that I'm going to describe to you and bring them or any form of them into your life, I promise you you'll have a successful career.
The first one is how we rebuild trust and it starts simply with telling the truth. Be truth tellers. Be truth speakers. But there's more to it than that. Besides being a truth speaker, you have to also be a truth seeker.
And seeking truth doesn't often come on platforms like X or TikTok or Yik Yak. And parents, if you don't know what Yik Yak is, ask your students, or even on platforms like Instagram. You have to dig deeper than that to find the truth that's out there. Then you have to be able to receive the truth, be a truth receiver. So, a truth speaker, a truth seeker, and a truth receiver. And what I mean by that is, in your life you're going to get a lot of people that will bring you bad news. Bad news that happens, whether it be under your watch, your fault, or even the person that brings it to you, whether it's their fault. How you handle that at that moment with humility and grace and courage to accept that bad truth will define you. So never shoot the messenger, no matter how bad the message is. And these things are very, very important.
And that type of humility will allow you to regroup, analyze whether or not something is really broken or wrong, then have the courage to go out and fix it. So that's behavior number one.
Behavior number two, be loyal. Now there's a lot of versions of loyalty that you can interpret by me saying, be loyal. I'm not talking about blind loyalty. I'm talking about the type of loyalty that starts with yourself. You've learned here during your journey here at Ohio State that nobody can take better care of you than yourself. You've already learned that. That will continue no matter how successful you go on to be in your career. You still have to take care of yourself. And I'm talking about physically, mentally, keeping that curiosity for learning, emotionally, ethically, even socially. Then how you remain loyal to everybody that you work with and everybody that you come in contact with. This is more than just treating everybody with dignity and respect.
This is about treating others as you would want to be treated yourself. And then finally, loyalty to everything that we work in our environment. Some of us will have the opportunity to work with very expensive equipment and gear. How we take care of that matters. Who you work with, the type of places that you work, the facilities you work in, the homes that you live in or rent. Even our environment, that's having a loyalty to our stuff, giving every inch of our being to keep the stuff that we work in and around, operating and get to its life cycle.
The last behavioral element is very simple. Be on time. That means seem a little bit different than some of the other things I talked about, but I don't know of anybody that's ever been successful in their career and been late at doing it. Now, maybe a few musical performers or rock stars, they may be allowed to be late getting on a stage. But every other profession, you got to be on time. And if you can deliver your product or service, regardless of what it is, with success on what I call first pass yield and be on time, you'll separate yourself from everybody else.
So that's it. Tell the truth, be loyal and be on time. And I guarantee you, you will have a very successful career.
Now, last thing I want to talk to you about is I, again, reiterate my congratulations on your commencement today is you will always have a home here at Ohio State. With your graduation, you will now join one of the largest and most powerful alumni groups in the world, 630,000 strong. No matter where you go, wherever you are at an airport, not even have to be at a football game, but wherever you are, when you say, “O-H!”
Audience:
“I-O!”
President Walter "Ted" Carter Jr.:
You know you're surrounded by friends and you will be able to come back here. And the traditions that we have here are not like any other. At the end of the ceremony here today, we will sing Carmen, Ohio. I know it will have an extra special meaning for you. It won't be the last time you ever sing it. But the words to that song, which we all know so well, are so powerful”
“Summer's heat or winter's cold
The seasons pass, the years will roll
Time and change will surely show
How firm thy friendship… Ohio!”
Congratulations, class of 2025. You are ready. Go change the world. Happy holidays to each and every one of you. And as always and forever, go Bucks!