6/12/98
Editors, news directors: A photo of Joel Rudy is available at:
http://www.ohiou.edu/news/pix/rudy.jpg
6/13/98
Editors, news directors: A five-minute feed of highlights of the Ohio
University 1998 commencement with U.S. House Speaker Newt Gingrich
and former hostage Terry Anderson will be at 16:30 EDT June 13.
Satellite coordinates are SBS6, transponder 9. Trouble number during
the uplink is (740) 593-4985.
Four JPEG photos suitable for newspaper reproduction of Saturday's commencement highlights will be available on the World Wide Web by 6 p.m. Saturday 6/13/98. Contact is University Photographer Rick Fatica, (740) 593-2565. The locations of the 4 photos will be:
ATHENS, Ohio -- A record 3,600 Ohio University undergraduate students participated in two commencement ceremonies Saturday at the Convocation Center as House Speaker Newt Gingrich addressed the afternoon session and former captive Terry Anderson spoke at morning commencement.
"The 21st century can be the century of science, progress and prosperity if we are willing to make it happen," Gingrich said. "It requires first that we in the federal government continue to invest massively in scientific basic research, and that's why I'm committed to doubling the (federal) research budget over the next decade."
Gingrich advised graduates of his personal formula for success.
"I have four sets of words that ... summarize for me what I've learned in my career and what I've learned in life having had two daughters grow up. And they are very simple: Dream big, work hard, learn every day and enjoy life," Gingrich said.
"If you truly want to be successful, do something you enjoy, because to succeed you have to do it all the time and if you don't enjoy it, you can't force yourself to do it. I would say to all of you, you are volunteers in life. If you get a job you don't like, change it. If you have a hobby that bores you, drop it. But think it through. You are given by God a chance to pursue happiness, which doesn't just mean frivolity, but it means the deepest sense of a life worth living."
Anderson's speech to the morning commencement came just a few weeks before he begins teaching at Ohio University's E.W. Scripps School of Journalism in July.
"These ceremonies are traditionally referred to as a commencement and hard as it is to think of right at this very moment, your education hasn't ended, it has just begun," said Anderson, a former Associated Press chief Middle East correspondent and seven-year hostage in Lebanon.
"I spent nearly seven years as a hostage in Lebanon -- 2,454 days," Anderson said. "In a few weeks, in the middle of my first class as a professor at Ohio University, I will reach 2,454 days of freedom since I came home. It's an important day for me."
Anderson said his years in captivity taught him the importance of learning and helping others.
"What you have acquired is just a basic set of tools, the very minimum knowledge on which to build a decent life. Those tools aren't limited to academic learning. Even more important for your life are the ethics and values that you learned here.
"For a truly successful life, one that means something to others, you will need a strong sense of obligation and responsibility. Obligation to the poor, the weak, the powerless; those who will never have the magnificent chance you've been given; responsibility to use your education, and the power it will lead you to, wisely and in service to others."
More than 3,600 students attended the ceremonies, according to commencement coordinator Gretchen Stephens. The 13,000-seat Convocation Center was nearly filled at both sessions, said Director of Facilities Management Sherwood Wilson.
Commencement ceremonies were split into two sessions in 1996 to accommodate an increasing number of undergraduates and their friends and relatives attending the ceremony.
The advanced degree commencement June 12 in the Convocation Center was addressed by Norman Gevitz, professor and chairman of the Department of Social Medicine at the Ohio University College of Osteopathic Medicine, where more than 600 master's, Ph.D. and doctor of osteopathy degrees were awarded.
