Virginia Commonwealth University Commencement Ceremony

​Richmond, Virginia, 22 May 2010

President Rao, members of the Board of Visitors, distinguished members of the Presidential party, Graduates, Parents and Distinguished Guests

A couple of weeks ago, a few thousand miles away in Qatar on the Arabian Gulf, I addressed the graduating students of Education City, which includes VCU Qatar, and I could see in their eyes, as I see today in yours, tremendous sense of accomplishment, excitement and joy.

You have worked hard over the past few years and today you reap the rewards for all your efforts.

Congratulations.

First of all I’d like to say how honored I am to address this commencement ceremony of Virginia Commonwealth University.

I feel very much at home here – your famous southern hospitality and your values remind me very much of my own country. Perhaps this is why we were able to build such a strong partnership from the very outset.

VCU is the senior university partner of Qatar Foundation. It believed in our vision and inspired others to follow in its footsteps. Almost 12 years later, VCUQatar is the leading design college of the Middle East region and has produced more than 250 graduates, three quarters of whom are Qatari women.

In this auditorium we have eight young Qataris – four are alumni and four are students of VCUQ.

They are from a country thousands of miles away; they have a different native language and culture; but they have similar values and principles to the rest of you here. If you ever have the chance to visit our country and take a stroll through one of our traditional markets, or souqs, as we call them, you will witness how VCU graduates have excelled at entrepreneurship by applying their knowledge to their own traditional environment. They are shaping their environment in a truly creative and dynamic way. And this is what I want to talk about briefly today.

I want to talk about potential - the potential of every individual. Within each of us there is a passionate interest waiting to be uncovered.

Education is one of the most powerful means for an individual to discover the promise that lies within. Through education, we hold in our hands real tools that we can use to engrave our mark on our world around us.

Whether it be in Qatar or the USA those graduating are equipped with new and wonderful tools – technology. Technology (social media, internet, ipads etc) has transformed the way we collect information and communicate, the way we do business, and in ways unimaginable only a few years earlier.

The changes are so dramatic that when many of you here today speak to anyone over 40 you cannot imagine how we managed to survive without mobiles or computers! Let me reassure you somehow we did manage!

My point is that the technologies around you are tools only. On a daily basis technology inundates us with information, from online news to 24 hour news. No incident – no matter how obscure or distant – is kept away from us and is repeated, commented upon and analyzed until it has lost all meaning.

We chat on facebook, join endless virtual communities and twitter to our heart’s delight. The result? Are we better informed? Are we really more connected as one human community? Or are we reduced, to quote Oscar Wilde, to knowing the price of everything but the value of nothing?

Perhaps more and more people need to question how they can use information and technology. For example, our curiosity and creativity, the use of technology, has led to new information about the nature of the human body – the functioning of the human mind.

It has extended the life span of those fortunate enough to be living in societies which are wealthy enough to offer quality healthcare. It has created new drugs to treat illnesses. But can we really say that this knowledge has been applied to the betterment of humankind as a whole? Or have knowledge and power become so intertwined that knowledge itself becomes the means through which power is sustained?

A short while ago, I was struck with the human potential to use information and knowledge for concrete plans of actions that can change the course of real lives. I had the privilege of visiting Yemen, to receive an update on a region wide project we have instigated called Silatech. Silatech aims at developing the potential of young people by giving them some basic tools to carve out their paths to success as entrepreneurs.

In Yemen I met a most impressive group of young people who are grasping opportunities to make dreams a reality. These young people really know what it means to apply information to the creation of real knowledge. In fact, they have reached beyond both information and knowledge and achieved wisdom.People say that wisdom comes with age, but I do not think this is necessarily true.

There are many wise young people and many foolish old ones. There are many unlettered people who are by nature wise and many brilliant professors who clearly aren’t. The young people I met in Yemen, who are creatively using every tool available to them for success, made me realize that technology cannot teach us wisdom.

Let me give you another example, of our students in Gaza, where the right to education is under tremendous pressure due to the blockade on Gaza. Last year we launched an educational program there called Al Fakhoora. Frankly we have been stunned and humbled by the potential of students in Gaza. Without even buildings and facilities to continue their education, they are persistent. And they are grasping every chance they can to build their future. So no.

Technology cannot teach us wisdom. But humility, patience and endurance can. And so can the ability to simply recognize our place among the community of humankind. To act selflessly and for the greater good – that is the greatest wisdom.

It is this message that I hope you reflect on. That we as human beings carry a potential within us which is greater than any technology and that our minds are more powerful than any computer.

And what unites us as humans are our shared virtues, our compassion, and a desire to carve a mark on this world. And it is those virtues which transcend any technological wonders. After all, it is the future that we are capable of creating which lies before you today, just as it lies before the VCU graduates in Qatar, and the students I spoke about in Yemen and Gaza.

But here is the key; do not be dazzled by technology, always remember it is your tool not your end. And never underestimate the power and value of a good act, a positive endeavor, no matter how small and insignificant it may appear to you.

For as the Quran tells us, a good word is like a good tree whose roots are firm and whose branches are in the sky.

So, to all of you today, stand firm and reach for the sky.

Thank You.