“I Have Undies,Too!” 

Tom Brokaw, the former NBC anchorman and author of “The Greatest Generation,” writes about his interview with an American paratrooper who had fought during World War II. The paratrooper had been isolated from his squadron but managed to find others who had been blown off course and they began considering plans to reunite with their main unit.

As they were moving behind enemy lines in search of their squadron, they saw a group of Germans marching toward a French village. Recognizing the danger the villagers faced, the paratroopers created a new plan and managed to save the village.

When Brokaw started praising the 80 plus year old veteran, he interrupted Brokaw and said, “We didn’t do anything special. We did our job.

This is one of the many reasons Brokaw refers to the generation of your grandparents and great grandparents as “The Greatest Generation.” They did their jobs, and did not expect to be praised for doing what they had to do.

So now it is time to talk about the job Greensboro College is supposed to do, and the job you are supposed to do. We’ll start with our job. Dr. Claudia Sullivan, a professor of Theatre and Communications at Schreiner University in Texas, gives us an outline of our primary job. Our job is to be another step along your way to the good life.

Hopefully, yours will be a good life, both here and later…a long and healthy life…a life with purpose…and a life with successes. But you are the one who will decide what constitutes a good life; what constitutes a life with purpose or a life with success. Greensboro College will give you the tools; you will decide how to use those tools. I hope you will reflect on the meaning of a liberal arts education; how it will benefit you and how the required courses of your individual degree plans have been designed to prepare you for your “good life.”

We will ask many things of you. We will ask that you be diligent in your pursuit of your academic goals. We will ask that you push yourself and see if you can achieve more than you thought you could, or more than others thought you could.

Last year, about two weeks into the semester, a freshman came to me all concerned about some things he had heard in one of his classes – things he thought were heretical at best. I told him then what I tell you today. Be open to new ideas and new ways of looking at the world. Don’t be threatened by ideas that may not make much sense to you at the time. Give knowledge time to settle in, poke around in it for a while before making up your mind and hopefully you will begin to see that things aren’t so complicated or heretical after all. By the way, that young freshman last year is a very happy and “at home” sophomore here this year.

More importantly, you will find that all knowledge is related to all knowledge. Yes, Shakespeare and Copernicus and Aristotle and Michelangelo and Picasso and the Prophet Isaiah really had similar ideas about important things like beauty and God and love and passion. All truth comes from God and leads ultimately to God. It is all connected. That’s what the liberal arts will show you.

Now, there is another thing we will ask of you. And here I am deadly serious. We will ask you to save the world! You may think that the only way to save the world is to be a big shot perched atop the world’s stage. Some think that to save the world you have to command mighty armies; be in a position to shift things around; be capable of making a single statement that will raise or lower the interest rates or cause the Stock Market to go up or down, or successfully pilot the shuttle Discovery.

In order to save the world, some say you have to be able to change the rules of the world. I say that is not the case. You save the world by saving yourself, one day at a time; by bringing new and optimistic outlooks to life.

That’s how you save the world from a pessimistic, doubtful, cynical, critical suicide. That’s how you avoid life’s mental cul-de- sacs.

A few years ago, I went to spend time with my granddaughter. It just happened to be during the week she was being potty trained. Now that’s an interesting experience. Several weeks later my granddaughter came to see me. When she arrived, she jumped out of the car and right there in the driveway with all the neighborhood watching and with all the excitement she could muster, she raised up her dress and exclaimed, “Look Poppie! I’m just like you. I have undies, too!” Meaning, she did not need diapers anymore.

Well, best I can tell each of you has undies too; you are housebroken, and you don’t need diapers anymore. You have learned to walk, to talk, to speak and to read. You have already learned to do the really hard things: you are ready to function in polite society, like wearing undies and removing your ball cap when you come indoors.

Actress Marlo Thomas wrote a book called “The Right Words at the Right Time.” In this book she interviewed 100 celebrities, politicians, sports figures and artists to find out what words came to them just when they needed to hear the right words:

     1     Tom Brokaw said he was coasting through college one day when his favorite professor called him in and said, “I’ve been thinking about what you’re going to do with your life and I have an idea. I think you should drop out of school.” Brokaw was floored but he needed that jolt to realize he was not working to his potential. Someone on this faculty may well give you such a kick in the pants.

     2     When Shaquille O’Neal was a teen-ager he worried that other players were better than he, and he was actually thinking of delaying his entry into professional ball. He told his mother, “Maybe later.” His mother’s reply was just what he needed to hear. She said, “Later doesn’t always come to everybody.” Do it now! Just last week The Shaq signed a $100 million contract with the Miami Heat. 

That’s what we are about at Greensboro College: in the classroom, in the dining hall, in the dormitory and those moments when you’re walking to an 8 a.m. class and you think no one is watching. We are trying to prepare you for your life: not only your life’s work, but your life on the Interstate Highway, in the grocery aisle, while you are tucking your 3 year old into bed at night or when you are in the voting booth or the concert hall. We take this very seriously and we trust you will too. Life is really very simple; not easy; but simple.

So when the faculty prods you a little too hard, or when they do not accept a half-hearted try at a term paper, or when we see you making poor decisions and we confront you, it’s because we care. Sounds just like your parents and neighbors back home, doesn’t it. It is true. You see, like you, we are in the business of saving the world too, one person at a time. We plan to start with you. 

Craven Williams
President
Greensboro College

I have one more announcement. A friend of Greensboro College, who wishes to remain anonymous, has made a gift. The donor believes very deeply in the quality and the promise of our theatre department, and the donor wants to encourage others to do the same.

Therefore, this donor has pledged to match, dollar-for-dollar, every dollar that we can raise for our theatre department … and the donor will put in up to $2 million, that means a total of $4 million … if we do our job.

This $4 million initiative will be called “The Standing Ovation!” It will be part of our “Promises to Keep” Campaign, which has now raised over $58 million. It’s an exciting way to begin a new academic year.

Craven E. Williams
President
Greensboro College