Graduation Reflections

Hello everyone –

Commencement weekend has arrived on the Urbana campus once again! A generation of students comes and goes in just four short years, and this May, the 56th class of ACES James Scholars will be crossing the stage at the State Farm Center on Sunday afternoon!

Here is a graduation message that I wrote ten years ago for the ACES James Scholar Class of 2008. My world has changed quite a bit as the current generation of students has been rising up through the ranks of our Honors Program, but hope has continued to spring forth for me in unexpected places, and I am extremely grateful for the opportunity to keep on working with such amazingly gifted young people like yourselves. The sentiments I expressed in this article have only grown stronger with the passing years, and I still look forward to seeing how your generation will change our world for the better as the 21^st century continues to unfold before us.

Ad Astra per Aspera!

By Rob Chappell, M.A., E.F.M., JS-ACT Advisor (Class of 1991)

Reprinted from Cursus Honorum VIII: 9 (May/June 2008)

The International Space Station (ISS) as seen from the departing space shuttle Endeavor on March 24, 2008. Innovative experiments in astroculture – the cultivation of plants in space – have been conducted on the ISS since 2001. (Photo Credit: NASA – Public Domain via Wikimedia Commons)

       Readers familiar with our website and our publications know that the JSMT’s official motto is a Latin proverb that translates into English as, “To the stars through striving!” As the 46th graduating class of ACES James Scholars walks across the stage this month, I would like to offer some brief reflections on this proverb as it relates to our seniors.

       The stars have always beckoned to us. Whether they shine like diamonds in the sky or as guiding lights in our hearts and minds, they inspire us to strive for new frontiers, overcome challenges, and look forward to a brighter future. None of these things, however, can be achieved by simply gazing up at the nighttime sky at an astronomy club meeting. We have to rise up from our lawn chairs, go to work the next morning, and devote ourselves wholeheartedly to achieving a better future for the human race.

       I have come to know many of you personally over the past four years, and I must confess that I am very impressed with what you have accomplished during your time spent in the College of ACES. You have passed challenging courses with flying colors, successfully completed undergraduate research projects, traveled overseas to expand your horizons, and filled important leadership roles in student organizations and community service projects.

       Because of all your achievements thus far, I have every confidence that each of you can and will make a positive impact on your chosen profession and on the world at large in the coming decades. Whether you end up working in a Chicagoland skyscraper, a rural veterinary clinic, a government research lab, or a community development project in a developing country, all of you have something uniquely valuable to contribute to the future of our world. I have come to believe that it is both the unity of your purpose and the diversity of your talents that will empower your generation to change the world for the better.

       Fulfilling the promise of your ACES education is what will indeed bring about a brighter tomorrow for our state, our country, and our emerging global civilization. As for me, I am eagerly waiting to see what all our new ACES James Scholar alumni are going to accomplish next year, next decade, and so on and so on, until we reach that bright human future among the stars that we all fervently wish for. The seeds of hope that you sow today will grow and bear fruit as you pursue your chosen professions with the courage and commitment that you have shown during your time in the ACES James Scholar Honors Program. Finally, when the time comes for me to retire and ride off into the sunset in about twenty years, I will go to the silver citizens’ home with confidence, knowing that the world is being improved because it will be in your capable hands.

Though much is taken, much abides; and though

We are not now that strength which in old days

Moved earth and heaven; that which we are, we are;

One equal temper of heroic hearts,

Made weak by time and fate, but strong in will

To strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield.

-- From “Ulysses” by Alfred, Lord Tennyson (1842)

Keep giving out hope, my friends!

Rob