Delia Milliron
April 14, 2018
I’m so pleased to share this occasion with you, our Honors Day Scholars. Thank you, President Fenves, for including me in this special event. And thank you students, for giving us a reason to gather here, to celebrate your scholarship and success at the University of Texas. I know I can speak for countless faculty colleagues who have had a chance to interact with you – as instructors, research mentors, academic advisors, and fellow members of this University community – when I say that we are inspired by and in awe of your intellect and your contributions to the University.
As I reflect on this accomplished group, I see the common thread of hard work and intellectual investment that brought you to UT and led you to such remarkable success in your endeavors here. I also see, in you and in our community at large, students, staff, and faculty who arrived in this shared community from so many different walks of life, different family experiences, different educational backgrounds, different philosophies and religions to make sense of life experiences.
Reflecting on my own undergraduate experience, now half a lifetime ago now, many of the most memorial experiences involved getting to know fellow students with passions for wildly different pursuits. As a chemistry major, I met mostly science and engineering students, and yet even among this group, diverse passions stood out.
There was a young woman, Jen, majoring in electrical engineering, but divinely artistic on the piano, having made a tough decision to decline her admission to The Julliard School to instead pursue a career in engineering. And my research lab mate in the chemistry department, who was admitted, in our final undergraduate year to Chemistry Ph.D. programs, but also to a prestigious program for an MFA in dance. She ultimately pursued her passion for dance and went on to dance and teach dance for a career.
There were of course also those driven to pursue rigorous MD/ Ph.D. degrees, including my roommate and fellow chemist, Sulene. I knew a computer scientist who recorded an electronica album, and also had his own special exhibit at the campus art gallery in our senior year.
And two friends – one a chemist and one another computer scientist – active in the theatre scene.
And, of course, I knew outstanding athletes (while I myself washed out of playing soccer after only one year of trying to balance academic and athletic pursuits). Incidentally, I washed out much earlier from playing trombone, so I’m inspired by the talented group we just heard. All this diversity of passion in a narrow slice of a community that I could sense was bustling throughout with the vibrant energy, interests, and abilities of my fellow students.
Although I met students from Australia, China, Korea, and more during my undergraduate years, it was not until graduate school that I got to know a classmate who had grown up in Mexico and not until I came to UT as a faculty member did I get acquainted with a colleague who had grown up in Africa.
While I am distressed in some ways that my intersections with those from more diverse international backgrounds have been relatively limited and have come later in life, I still owe many of these opportunities to the context of the University setting.
Now, I love to come to this campus every day, to walk the new bricks of Speedway in the evening with all of you, and to feel that same energy and passion that made such an impression on me so many years ago as an undergraduate, when I gained my first immersion in a community brought together from distant places and experiences.
Why have these people I met as an undergraduate, and their passions, stuck with me over the intervening years?
Universities like ours are amazing places to study, live, and experience in part because of our shared purpose, but in a larger way because of our diverse pursuits and diverse pathways that brought us to this place and this time.
Behind the scenes in admissions, but also in every department and every college, faculty, staff, and students are working actively to cultivate this amazing diverse community. To be sure, it’s a struggle. And to be sure, we are succeeding more or less modestly, or even failing in some ways. But, to the extent you’ve appreciated, been inspired by, or even been transformed (as I was) by the experience of interacting with those who arrived here from a different place, or with a different passion than yourself, realize that this community does not exist by accident, nor is it automatic.
Neither is it trivial to have these opportunities to intersect with and experience life with such an amazing, diverse group of people who are not “other,” or apart from you, but are instead at the core, with you and with me, of this. Of us. Of Texas.
I tell you all this, with reflection on the import and impact of my own undergraduate experience on my life since that time, not only to inspire gratitude towards the many Longhorns who work every day to build this community.
Much more, I am telling you all this to encourage you to be active, as you go out to wide-flung corners of Texas, of the country, and of the world. To be active in the communities you will join next, whether for a month, a year, or for a career or a lifetime, in cultivating diversity there.
Cultivate diversity in your own experience by deliberately interacting with someone who seems to have a different perspective, a different background than you. Take the time to understand those working around you – especially those in very different roles than your own. What motivates them in their work, what inspires them in their life?
I guarantee you will become a more effective colleague and (perhaps eventually), some of you, a more effective manager. I expect you will also be enriched by personal inspiration and friendships you could not anticipate.
I encourage you also, as you become immersed in new communities, new organizations around the globe, to cultivate diversity in your new environment. ---
To actively and deliberately advocate for the inclusion and recruitment of people who bring diverse perspectives, who add to the stimulating environment and enrich everyone, even as they stand to be enriched. Soon, it will fall upon you, to be the stewards of your communities, to cultivate strong, diverse intersections of people. In this way, I expect you will not only grow personally, you will build the strongest companies, incubate the most important discoveries, and cultivate the most striking artistic achievements in the communities you are members of in the years to come.
The strength of UT is you. It is all of you. And as our Longhorn community will only get stronger as we include a broader range of people and perspectives, you too have the opportunity to develop strong, competitive, unique, and outstanding organizations where ever you go from here.
I appreciate, and we as a community appreciate, your tremendous investment of hard work and scholarship that brought you to this moment. And I look forward expectantly to your diverse accomplishments in every walk of life as you go forward in ways and to places you now anticipate, and beyond to places you cannot now imagine. For those of us who have had the privilege to know you here and now, I know you will make us proud with your achievements. I hope you will also make us proud with the strong communities you build around yourselves, where ever you go.
Congratulations, Honors Day Scholars. Enjoy this moment, reflect on your years here at Texas, and carry the strength of your Longhorn experiences and of this community with you. Thank you.