Commencement 2017: "Seek, be faithful and endeavor," Dr. Patrick Awuah urges graduating class

 

Honorable Minister for Tertiary Education; Your Excellencies, the US Ambassador to Ghana and the Denmark Ambassador to Ghana; Members of the Board; Distinguished Guest Speaker; Odeefuo Oteng-Korankye II; Nananom; Vice Chancellors of the University of Cape Coast, and the University of Mines; Parents, Family and Friends; Dear Class of 2017; Welcome to the 13^th commencement ceremony at Ashesi University College. Class of 2017, congratulations on reaching this important milestone in your lives. This year, on 4^th March 2017, we marked Ashesi’s fifteenth anniversary. This year, we also lost a dear friend, Professor Nana Araba Apt, who served as the founding academic dean of our institution. I would like to acknowledge her with a moment of silence.

 

Class of 2017, let us also take a moment, with loud applause this time, to thank all those whose contributions have helped bring you to this day. Take a moment to visualize all those who crossed your mind as you applauded: their faces, their names, and the roles they played in getting you here. Who was on your list?

 

My list included people you would expect: Your families who nurtured and supported you to this stage in your life’s journey; the faculty who guided you through your studies here; the administrators who invited you to join our community, who counseled you through difficulty, who advised you on career choices, who raised funding for this institution and for your scholarships, and who worked relentlessly to create and maintain this nurturing environment we call Ashesi.

 

But my list also included people you probably didn’t include on yours. My list spans seventeen years: Two years of preparation, and fifteen years since we first began classes at Ashesi University College.

 

My list includes my family; Odeefuo Oteng-Korankye II, whose foresight and warm embrace made possible our campus here in Berekuso; and the elders and youth leaders of Berekuso who supported Nana Oteng-Korankye’s decision.

 

My list includes teachers and professors at Chapel Hill School, Association School, Achimota School, Swarthmore College and UC Berkeley, who educated me.

 

My list includes my colleagues at Microsoft Corporation; the philanthropists and foundations who have supported Ashesi’s mission; and members of our Board of Trustees and Board of Directors, past and present.

 

My list includes the architects and engineers who built this place; and former professors and administrators of Ashesi who helped launch this institution.

 

My list includes alumni of Ashesi, whose accomplishments and character have driven the reputation of their alma mater.

 

If we added all our lists together, we would probably still not fully capture just how much effort has gone into making this day possible for you, Class of 2017.

 

We owe a huge debt of gratitude to all those who have made this day possible. We come here today as an expression of our connectedness. We come here to celebrate your accomplishments. We come here as an expression of our belief in your promise as a force for good in the world.

 

This morning, I would like to invite you to join me in a conversation that I began with the Mandela-Washington Fellows last month about what we all need to do to become the leaders who will serve collectively as a force for good in Africa and in the world. As you know, that fellowship has a very similar mission to ours, which is, to nurture future leaders in Africa.

 

I would like to share some lessons from outside the classroom, from my practice of Shotokan Karate, which I began in college. 28 years of practice, with a one year break as we tried to ship the Windows NT operating system, a one year break after I failed my first black belt exam, and a one year break as we tried to launch Ashesi University. So 25 years of actual training.

 

I have continued to practice all these years because I love the physically of it and the economy of movement as we try to sharpen our skills. I love pushing myself. But that is not what I want to talk about this morning. Rather, I want to speak with you about lessons that I’ve learned from the Dojo Kun –a statement of affirmation that we make at the end of every training session.

 

Why character and not skill? And why not ACHIEVE perfection? Why just seek? First, the right character leads to the right skill. Second, perfection is hard to achieve. Impossible even. A statement asking us to achieve perfection would be a statement that pushes us towards failure, because we cannot, in fact, achieve perfection.

Even defining “perfect character” is difficult to do. Let us consider some of the classic values that lead to good character – generosity, optimism, humility, patience, honesty, and so on. What is perfect humility? Might too much humility not result in meekness; and would that be useful for a martial artist or a leader? How about patience? Surely, there are some things we should be patient about, but others that we should not be patient about. We could say similarly for many other values that drive good character. The key, then, is to seek. To search, and to never stop.

 

Faithfulness is about loyalty to a cause and to others. In the martial arts, perhaps we could consider it as loyalty to the Way of the Warrior. Protect the truth. Protect justice.

 

But it is more than that. It is also loyalty to society and to others. Do we recognize that a relationship exists between ourselves and others? Do we understand the nature of those relationships? Do we value them? The answers to these questions give us a measure of our loyalty.

 

You will need to ask yourselves these questions about your professional and personal relationships, and also about your relationship with society as a whole. To be loyal to a friend. To be loyal to a spouse. To be faithful to a child. Ah, to be loyal to a child is no small matter.

 

One word, yet with such profound meaning. Show up. Just try. I remember my sensei, when he would demonstrate an advanced technique and see our hesitation, would say, “Just try.” This word, endeavor is about making an attempt. It is also about fortitude and grit.

Let me share a brief story about my experience with difficulty. Thankfully, by my graduation day, I had secured a job. But that was not my first plan. My plan was to graduate with a bachelor’s degree and to enroll immediately in graduate school to become a “Master of Engineering” and then to enter the world of work. So, I applied to about eight graduate schools. I got accepted, but no one offered me the scholarships that I needed. My financial situation was such that they might as well not have accepted me.

 

In a moment of weakness, I blamed Swarthmore College for my predicament. To be more precise, I blamed the faculty, who I thought had been too stingy with their A’s. I figured, if only they had awarded me a few more A’s, I would have had a stronger grade point average and would have been more likely to earn a merit scholarship for graduate school. That was a moment of weakness.

 

But I persevered. I pursued Plan B and applied for jobs. In the end, I ended up at Microsoft Corporation. That new path, working at Microsoft, made Ashesi possible. The network and the experience I gained there have been essential to the success of my current enterprise. Each step of my journey required that I endeavor. Success in college and at Microsoft required hard work and persistence. Also, when I felt fear and hesitated to take on the task of starting a new university in Ghana, I eventually decided to “just try,” as my sensei had asked us to do for years.

 

I urge you, Class of 2017 to endeavor in the coming years.

 

Be polite. Do not underestimate your others. Do not hold others in contempt, especially those with whom you disagree. To disrespect or hold others in contempt is to close the door to compromise.

 

Refrain from violence? In a martial art? Yes!

 

What is violence anyway? Pope Francis once called corruption one of the most brutal forms of violence in the world, because it suppresses societies and keeps people in poverty.

 

It starts with your thoughts. And from your thoughts, your words, your actions, your habits, your character, your destiny.

 

To refrain from violence means to moderate your thoughts, your words, and your actions. Everything else depends on these.

 

Class of 2017, we have great hope for the future and your role in it. So,

 

 

I leave you with these thoughts to ponder on your Commencement Day, and I wish you Godspeed in the days and years ahead. Congratulations!