2004 Fall Commencement / University of Wisconsin-Green Bay

Presented by Wisconsin Supreme Court Justice David T. Prosser Jr.

Chancellor Shepard; members of the University community; parents, family, and friends of the graduates; and, most important, members of the 2004 graduating class:

Thank you very much for inviting me to be part of your commencement exercises.

It is an honor to be here to offer congratulations to the class of 2004 and to extend my best wishes for your future success. It is a privilege to be here to speak about the future ... on this first day of your post-undergraduate lives.

Some of you will go on for additional education. Some of you will plunge headlong into your first full-time employment. Some of you will begin families.

These familiar endeavors seem more difficult today than when I was sitting in your place. To illustrate, when I was in college, I applied to only one law school and I was completely confident that I would be accepted. I'm not at all sure that, if I tried to get into that same law school today, my record in college — including good grades — would be enough to overcome my pathetic score on the law school admission test. Today prudence would dictate that I apply to several schools and perhaps take the LSAT again.

The competition today is much stiffer than when I applied for law school almost 40 years ago. Back then, I didn't have to compete against hundreds of exceptionally gifted women. My new colleague on the Supreme Court, Louis Butler, could add that I didn't have to compete against many talented minorities either. By contrast, you do.

Today we live in a world of intense competition where almost nothing can be taken for granted. Graduate schools are only one example. Many qualified applicants don't get what they want. And, of course, getting into a school does not solve the problem of how to pay for it.

Whatever your individual plans, one thing is certain: the University of Wisconsin-Green bay has prepared you well for the challenges ahead.

When, at various points, you become discouraged — and I suspect you will — please remember the many people who never had the spectacular opportunity you had to attend and graduate from this university. That should help keep you going.

When you do well — and you will — please remember the many people who deserve a similar chance to attend this university, and find some way to lend a hand.

Now, let's get down to business.

Delivering a commencement address is not an easy assignment. Most speakers are not content to invoke a few noble sentiments and then sit down. They want to provoke thought and say something that will be remembered. Of course, these lofty aspirations are seldom realized. My strategy today is to talk bluntly about your generation ... in a highly competitive world.

In many ways, I am a poor candidate to talk about your generation. Analytically, most of you are so-called "echo boomers," while I am a "mature." By accident of birth, I have been assigned to a generation — "the matures" — that began in 1909 (when Teddy Roosevelt was president) and stretched to 1945 (the end of World War II). Thus, I belong to a generation three times removed from yours. I predate the baby boomers ... and still don't have a cell phone!

Chronologically, the matures, or traditionalists, were followed by the baby boomer generation, made up of people born between 1946 and 1964. This massive group likely includes most of your parents.

The boomers, in turn, were followed by Generation X, made up of people born between 1965 and 1981. Although there is some dispute about dates, the conventional view is that the echo boomer generation — also known as the millenials or Generation Y — began in 1982.

The significance of these categories rests on the premise that different generations have different characteristics and values. The Yankelovich Monitor website explains that "generations are bonded by the shared life experiences in their formative years."

It goes on: "Understanding the fundamental values that define generations is the first step in developing greater precision and relevance in any marketing or product development effort. Insight into core values of generations also provides the ability to predict and anticipate how generations will approach new life stages and lifestyle choices."

In my view, understanding the core values of a generation may also give us an ability to predict and anticipate how that generation will lead and preserve this country.

There is something quite unnatural for me to be linked to what Tom Brokaw called "the greatest generation." After all, I didn't live though the depression, and when American GIs were storming the beaches at Normandy and raising the flag at Iwo Jima, I was still in diapers. But I share the values of the mature generation, namely, duty, honor, country; dedication, sacrifice; patience; hard times, then prosperity; national pride; and the critical importance of doing a good job.

Your generation ... is a work in progress. According to a recent CBS television report, "echo boomers are a reflection of the sweeping changes in American life over the past 20 years. They are the first to grow up with computers at home ... they are multi-taskers with cell phones, music downloads, and instant messaging on the internet. They are totally plugged-in citizens of a worldwide community."

The CBS report was complimentary, especially about your optimism and independent thinking, but it worried that echo boomers may have been over managed.

The CBS report quotes Mel Levine, a professor from the University of North Carolina, as saying that echo boomers have "been heavily programmed." Their "whole lives have really been based on what some adult tells them to do. This is a generation that has long aimed to please. They've wanted to please their parents, their friends, their teachers, their college admissions officers."

According to CBS, yours is a generation in which "rules seem to have replaced rebellion, convention is winning out over individualism, and values are very traditional." Yet, Professor Levine sounded a warning. He said that your generation's "group-think is stifling initiative." Because echo boomers "have always been rewarded for participation, not achievement," he said, "they don't have a strong sense what they are good at and what they're not." He adds that when echo boomers begin work, "they [often] expect to be immediate heroes and heroines. They expect a lot of feedback on a daily basis. They expect grade inflation, they expect to be told what a wonderful job they're doing. [They expect] they're gonna be allowed to rise to the top quickly. that they're gonna get all the credit they need for everything they do. And boy, are they naïve. totally naïve, in terms of what's really gonna happen."

A commencement address should be a challenge, not a jeremiad, and that is my purpose here today. Professional football teams like the Packers are not the only groups that may need to consider half-time adjustments.

Graduation day is a critical day for young people because it symbolizes a break from the programming and structure of school and family — and a new beginning in which graduates are forced to program themselves. This independence can be liberating.

Graduation day is the day that newly liberated graduates can begin to show their stuff and prove their critics wrong.

The class of 2004 is one of the first classes of echo boomers to finish college and enter the work force. Thus, your performance as adults ... fully immersed in society ... will set the tone for your entire generation.

There can be no doubt whatever about your intelligence and talent. The class of 2004 is endowed with tremendous energy and brainpower, as well as the knowledge and skill to make great things happen. The unanswered questions involve your motivation, your vision, and your ability to handle adversity.

Your challenge today is to answer these questions ... with excellence and achievement.

Today we live in a world of intense competition where almost nothing can be taken for granted. For proof just look at the U.S. mens' basketball team that was badly embarrassed at last summer's Olympics. They faced the sort of international competition at a high level that you will face over a lifetime.

Graduates, the future of our country is in your hands.

President Kennedy said that "in the long history of the world, only a few generations have been granted the role of defending freedom at its hour of maximum danger." Because of world terrorism, you are one of those generations.

The German poet Goethe advised, "that which you inherit from your fathers, you must earn in order to possess." You have inherited an unprecedented standard of living. Because of intense competition from Europe, Asia, and our own hemisphere, your generation has the burden to maintain the American economy and assure that it grows.

The great educator Horace Mann said: "Be ashamed to die until you have won some victory for humanity." There is no shortage of opportunities for you to assume that challenge.

Somewhere in America, there is a young child ... a young Tom Brokaw ... who will eventually go into journalism and write a book about you and your times. What will be the title of that book? Will it be "The Greatest Generation"? That possibility is up to you.

Congratulations and good luck!