Yakima Valley Community College Commencement Address (As Written)

June 8, 2006

Governor Gregoire: Mr. President, faculty, graduates, parents, friends and family:

Congratulations to all you graduates. I�m delighted and honored to share this important day with you.

I have to admit, graduation speeches are very challenging to prepare.

After all, graduates make up half the audience and they, if I remember right, are almost universally thinking, �This speaker is all that stands between me and our celebration.�

Parents make up another large segment, and from personal experience, I know they are sitting out there smiling politely because they are thinking, �Yes! Another round of tuition payments is finally over!�

I�ve looked on the Internet for some advice on writing graduation speeches.

Doonesbury creator Garry Trudeau observed that commencement speeches were invented largely in the belief that outgoing college students should never be released into the world until they have been properly sedated.

Someone else suggested that a graduation ceremony is an event where the commencement speaker tells hundreds of students, dressed in identical caps and gowns, that 'individuality' is the key to success.

I have also noticed that graduation speakers tend to use themes like roads less traveled. Embarking on a new road in life, or a life of purpose. They also use lots of words like opportunities, adversity, or adventure.

But frankly, no one has summed it up better than Woody Allen. �It is clear the future holds great opportunities. It also holds pitfalls. The trick will be to avoid the pitfalls, seize the opportunities, and get back home by six o'clock,� he wisely advised.

As I prepared for these remarks, I was struck by how different the world is today from when I graduated.

When I grew up there were three television channels -- and they were in black and white. We had typewriters and record players.

And if you mentioned DVDs, PCs, IPODs, CDs, VCRs, or MTV, I would have thought you lost your mind.

Less than a decade ago a story in the San Francisco Chronicle noted occasional articles in various publications �about this strange network of networks, that might be worth watching.�

The Chronicle writer went on to say most stories depict the Internet as, �a technical oddity, the province of nerds, and stay-at-homes, with the occasional child pornographer or software pirate added to the mix.�

A technical oddity indeed.

Consider these other measures of change:


  • The information supply available to us doubles every five years.
  • The weekday edition of The New York Times contains more information than the average person was likely to come across in a lifetime during the 17th century.
  • The cost of computing power continues dropping each year and microchips are doubling in performance power every 19 months.
  • Today�s average consumers wear more computing power on their wrists than existed in the entire world before 1961.


I love these little factoids, but do you ever wonder who the heck comes up with them?

At the same time, there have been other global-changing trends:

  • Gas used to be 35 cents a gallon;
  • The Berlin Wall, a symbol of the Soviet Union, Cold War and nuclear arms race, came crashing down;
  • A mouse became more than a furry little animal and a blackberry was more than a piece of fruit
  • Outsourcing, open-sourcing, in-sourcing, and off-shoring all became new verbs; and
  • Windows weren't just for breaking anymore.


In his book, The World Is Flat, New York Times columnist Thomas Friedman has pulled all these trends together.

He sees a convergence of forces creating a global, web-enhanced playing field that allows for multiple forms of collaboration, the sharing of knowledge, and work in real time without regards to geography, distance or in the near future, even language.

It has, he said, flattened the world

Others call it globalization.

It is the defining characteristic of your generation and this new century.

But try to describe it, and you start to thirst for an extra-large Starbucks drip! It�s like defining the Internet or electricity�we understand it in the abstract, we know it plays a critical role in our lives, but we don�t think it�s something that really concerns us. It just �is��

So I won�t talk about transnational corporations or integrated markets today. (Did I hear sighs of relief out there)?

Globalization simply means that we�re more connected�like the invention of the telephone�times a billion!

Everything from knowledge, to finances, to goods and services, racing at lightening speed. And today, in this new century, everyone�s a neighbor.

You order a DVD over the Internet from Amazon.com that�s flown from Singapore to Seattle and then trucked to Yakima. You drive a passenger car that was assembled in Kentucky with parts manufactured in Mexico and a headquarters in Japan.

You watch �The Simpsons� on Sunday night with production in Los Angeles and animation in South Korea.

All good and well, you think. But now you�re competing not only with the folks next door, but folks in Peru and in Ireland.

That computer store you plan to open in the Tri-Cities next year will now be competing with Dell in Texas and a few thousand start-ups in India.

So, we all have good reason to care. Even with your new degree and great education at YVCC, there are no guarantees in the Era of Globalization.

There�s no guarantee that your standard of living will be the same or better than your parents��a promise that is the cornerstone of the American dream.

We grow excited about advances in healthcare, and then we learn about the threat of avian flu. We decide to backpack around Europe, and then we witness the spread of international terrorism. Growing more connected has its downside.

But despite the downsides, I am very optimistic that all of you and our state can and will step up to the challenges of globalization.

You�ve come this far�and your education will launch you wherever you want to go or whatever you choose to do. It�s just that your strength and greatness as students will now go head-to-head with the strength and greatness of a few billion more folks than those faced by my pre-Internet, pre-globalized generation.

Each generation is put to the test. War or rumors of war, the civil rights era, the Cold War. Each generation in this country�when faced with challenges or threats�rises to the occasion and makes whole the promise of our country:

That any woman or man, with education and a passion for success, can transcend adversity and accomplish extraordinary things.

Today, is a call to action for you. Globalization is no ordinary force, and this is no ordinary time. You can do it�seize the day! You now have your degree, and I hope you�ll think of education as lifelong learning.

In a world as connected as ours, you must.

In this new global movement, we�re on the front lines. We�re more like a small nation, not a state. Just consider the leaders who have visited Washington and marveled at our industries and culture over the last few weeks:

President Hu of China and President Vicente Fox of Mexico.

I have great faith that Washington is well positioned to opportunities of globalization, but only if we are prepared to meet the challenges. So today I would like to issue a call to action. We�ve entered a new era, and you�re the pioneers who will get us there.

My hope is that you approach the challenges of globalization just like those of my generation embraced JFK�s call to place a man on the moon. We dream big as Americans, and we do great things when we�re put to the test.

If we build a world class education system, if we protect our environment, and if we give of ourselves and help build strong communities, we not only will be highly competitive, we will make this a better state for your children and future generations.

Education needs to be our touchstone�our paramount duty, as the Washington Constitution requires � and I challenge all of you to help us build a world class education system in this state.

Senator Ted Kennedy once said that a job is the best social program we can offer. So let�s make sure we offer our kids an education that gives us one of the most skilled, innovative and creative workforces in the world.

We now know that young people have the capacity to learn far more than we ever dreamed. But we need to break the old education model that is textbook focused, that too often fails to prepare kids to learn, that is often not relevant to students, and isn�t responsive to individual needs.

Now I understand many of you don�t have a direct hand in our education system, but you can work with me to push for more effective ways of learning to our schools.

We have to believe in our students and their ability to succeed then challenge them with courses that will help them achieve their goals.

We must strive for quality education for every student. In some countries today they are selecting the top 10 percent of their students for quality educations. That�s not good enough. Every child in this country has to be given the opportunity to pursue his or her dreams.

We must give every child a chance to succeed in school. In our education system today, we know only 50 percent of the kids are prepared to learn when they enter kindergarten.

We also know 90 percent of brain development happens in the first five years of life and that a large share of the gap in academic achievement could be closed if all children had better early learning experiences.

That�s why we have made early learning a priority.

We should tailor educational experiences to the individual student.

We should take a world-view in our education system. A high school business class, for instance, could introduce business concepts from other parts of the world and math and science classes could share information about research conducted in other parts of the world.

The opportunity to learn languages other than English should be available from preschool through graduate school, and as Americans, we need to better understand other cultures.

The second element of my call to action is environmental protection.

Washington is a clean, green part of the world.

Make no mistake, our environment is an absolutely vital advantage in a competitive global economy.

To compete successfully, Washington needs clean water, air and soil � and healthy people, communities and workplaces.

We also need adequate natural resources to sustain communities, economic output, transportation and a dynamic and competitive work force.

Think about two of our gems -- the Columbia River and Puget Sound.

The Columbia provides water to counties that generate $27 billion in payroll and to agriculture which is the state number one employer and a $29 billion industry for us.

Puget Sound supports $20 billion in economic activities and is integral to the quality of life for 4.1 million people who live near its shores.

But it is not enough to think just locally in this new global world.

Remember, growing more connected has its downsides, and for a state like ours, global warming can have devastating consequences.

In our state it can cause floods, more air pollution, more forest and range fires, more insect damage to our crops, and a decline in our native plant and animal populations.

Our salmon � an icon of the Pacific Northwest -- and other coldwater fish runs will decline.

Reduced snowpack will create more frequent droughts, harm our valuable agriculture and ski industries and reduce the electricity we can generate for homes, businesses and communities.

Don�t forget, Washington has more than 3,000 miles of marine coastline. Rising sea level will increase coastal erosion and flooding, causing great harm to our shoreline communities, including low-lying areas several major cities.

My call to action doesn�t have to require great things from you for the environment. It simply means paying attention to little things, like committing to never pouring anything down a storm drain, keeping natural vegetation around our homes and shorelines, using use less water, at home and at work, and reducing use of fertilizers, pesticides and herbicides.

Finally, I�d like to call you all to action in your communities.

Without strong communities we will never compete. We have to bring everyone along in this global journey and often that means we have to reach out and help others.

And don�t for a minute underestimate the power you have to help another person.

As Attorney General and as Governor, I have been approached by dozens of young people who proudly told me of their successes and added that an adult, who was not their parent, were responsible for turning their life around.

So you can make a difference. You can help us make sure we have strong communities where we all are moving ahead.

All of us here today � graduates, parents, friends and family -- are embarking on one of the most exciting times in history. These times will test us, but I know we are up to the challenge.

Just as we were able to rise to President Kennedy�s challenge to put the first man on the moon, I know we together can help Washington flourish in this global economy.


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