Tip:
Highlight text to annotate it
X
Thank you, Lisa.
Thank you, Lisa and mommy.
Assembly Member Wilmer Amina Carter represents the 62nd District
and serves as the assistant majority policy leader for the state assembly.
She chairs the select committee in the Inland Empire Transportation, serves in the
California Workforce Investment Board and promotes stable communities through green jobs training
and neighborhood gardens.
She served for 16 years on the Rialto School Board.
In fact, the high school in Rialto is named after her in her honor for
her dedication to students and education Rialto. Please, welcome her
she is going to give our keynote address today.
[Carter' Good morning to our platform guest
and to the graduates of... 2011, good morning to you.
I am so honored to share this day with you
but really,
commencement at eight o'clock in the morning on a Saturday? [Applause]
I'm sure it is just a reminder of all the early mornings, late nights
and skip lunches that brought you here
but also,
a reminder of all the hard work
and sacrifices that you made.
Whether it's anthropology,
history,
economics,
philosophy
or political science,
earning your degree today shows that you have the creativity and the tenacity to
succeed in the complex world ahead.
One of the prerogatives of being a graduate graduation speaker is getting to share a
lifetime of experiences and ideas.
In the African-American community, there is the principle of Sankofa.
Sankofa said
that in order to move forward,
we most also remember who we are
and how we got there.
The symbol for Sankofa is a bird walking forward
and looking backwards at the same time.
All of us,
with our diverse backgrounds
and personal histories,
must acknowledge our past
and learn from it.
I was born
in southern part of the United States,
my grandfather was a farmer
and I was last of the grand children born in my grandfather's house.
When I was born in in the South
I could not go to school with people who
we're not the same color as I.
So, my grandfather was my first teacher.
He'd built a church with three other families on his property,
and he taught school in that church.
He started teaching me when I was three years old.
He said, I'm going to teach you to read, I'm going to teach you how to serve
and what I want you to do is use your education for service.
He said I don't want you to
allow your color,
nor your gender, to get into the way of you getting an education,
because if you an education, you can do anything in this country that
you want to be.
And so, I always remember what my grandfather told me
and I've always gone that way,
and throughout my journey
I've always honored my grandfather and all who helped to shake me and who put
me on their shoulders
so I can rise above,
and I've always tried to make room on my shoulders for others,
and I hope you will do the same.
So, honor the past
and learn from it.
You must also take on the present.
You must engage the present
and improve it.
I believe you are committed to doing just that
or you wouldn't be in the schools of humanities in the first place.
Look at the advances we have seen in the past few years in technology
if only there had been similar advances in humanity.
We're faster,
more connected
and more easily entertained.
We have iPads, iPods, Twitter, Facebook,
but are we better,
smarter,
kinder,
more compassionate
more aware of the beauty to be found in art and nature?
Is it progress when our politics are dominated by talk radio
and our culture seems overrun with reality shows?
I think you can do better.
I hope that you will do better.
The toughest job happens dot you there,
and I know it will be spread over many disciplines,
is to make sure life,
in a world filled with technology,
doesn't suffocate our humanity.
So,
I asked you to engage the present,
and improve it,
and then there's the future,
you have to imagine the future
and then forge it.
When I
served on the school board in Rialto,
I was fortunate enough to have the board name a high school in my honor,
the Wilmer Amina Carter High School.
So, I get an opportunity to speak to students each year.
Two years ago,
I said to them,
that they would be world citizens
and I encouraged them to study math and sciences
and learn a...
minimum of at least three languages
and learn to communicate with the world.
This past year,
I encouraged them
to do the same and do more
because they would be the generation
that would navigate galaxies,
and I said that,
and I told them the story about my grandfather saying that if
I got an education
I could do anything in this country.
Isn't that the equivalent of so many decades ago
of his message to me,
and my message to them.
So, I invite you to keep open to new ideas and new experiences,
keep growing,
keep learning
and keep seeking,
because gadgets are great -
but it takes people to invent
it takes people to build
and it takes people to inspire,
and you have to be those people.
Inside of each of you
is the most valuable technology the world has ever seen
heart and soul,
mind and spirit.
You owe it to yourselves
and everyone who loves you,
and supports you
and wants you to be the best.
To use that technology
to go as far as you can, and take as many others with you as you go.
So, let me say again
honor the past
and learn from it,
embrace the
present and improve it,
imagine the future
and forge it.
UC Riverside graduates 2011,
I wish for you blessings without member and all the things without end.
Congratulations, to each in everyone of you.