The past few months have been a season of graduations for new NPs and PAs across the country. Recently, I tallied all the graduation ceremonies I have attended since I began my journey in academe some 16 years ago, which came out to about 27 ceremonies—so I have watched more than 4,500 graduates walk across the stage. How exciting that has been!
Last year, I had the opportunity to be a commencement speaker, a daunting responsibility and one that I did not take lightly. I’d like to share my graduation comments with you in this editorial—dedicated to all the new PA and NP grads:
Garry Trudeau, an American cartoonist best known for the Doonesbury comic strip, said, “Commencement speeches were invented largely in the belief that outgoing college students should never be released unto the world until they have been properly sedated.” With that in mind, I will keep my remarks to a minimum. I promise. The educational process has been the subject of a great deal of comment by academics and writers over the past few decades. It has been said that education is an easy target for criticism because its stated aims are often so nobly ambitious that they have little chance of being realized. According to the poet Robert Frost, education is “hanging around until you’ve caught on.”
Your class, like most graduating classes, is unique. You come from all walks of life and all points on the map. As you are poised today on this joyous yet transitional moment, I encourage you to imagine an image of standing on the shoulders of giants. Sir Isaac Newton said, “We are like dwarfs sitting on the shoulders of giants. We see more, and things that are more distant, than they did, not because our sight is superior or because we are taller than they, but because they raise us up, and by their great stature add to ours.”
Whatever image this calls to mind for you, I want to briefly tell you about three important giants. The first is that colleague, family member, or professor who was your mentor. For me, it was Dr. Burton Brasher, a preceptor, mentor, and friend who taught me the importance of sitting with patients and allowing them to be partners in their own care. Integrity and compassion are what he brought to the table as a family doctor in the 1970s and ’80s. I recently had the opportunity to attend his 90th birthday party. Indeed, I had the opportunity to stand on the shoulders of a giant.
The second giant is well known to you. Many examples are seated behind me and perhaps seated behind you now. Who is that person who has equipped you to enter your chosen profession? Who is that person who supported you at home from grade school to grad school? Your faculty, both didactic and clinical, and your family and friends are giants who have given you the opportunity to stand on their shoulders.
The third giant will be born in just a few minutes. That giant, ladies and gentlemen, is you. You now have the opportunity to take your knowledge and skills, your integrity and your compassion, and become a giant in your community. A giant that others can stand on, lean on, rely on, whether they be family members, friends, or students. As John F. Kennedy said, “The torch has been passed to a new generation.” I urge you to take hold of that torch.
The diversity among you has enriched your school, the university as a whole, and each of you individually. While what you brought was diverse, you will all leave with the same credential—a degree setting you apart as a clinician. The degree you will receive today is much more than a piece of paper, much more than initials behind your name.
You have been reminded many times about the expectations that society has for you. Those expectations will only increase as you go forth from today. Your profession has a calling that is devoted to health, healing, caring, and compassion. Society has entrusted its health and well-being to you, and with that trust comes a responsibility that is unmatched in other professions.
While you’ve spent long, sometimes grueling, hours mastering the skills of your new profession, what will make the difference in your success now is what comes from your heart.
Your work will be filled with challenges and opportunities, moments of disappointment, years of joy. Your patients will share their innermost thoughts and life experiences, things they won’t share with anyone else—not parents, not children, not spouses.