On May 15, 2015 I had the honor of giving the commencement speech for my graduating class at the University of Massachusetts Dartmouth.
The full speech is on YouTube.
Transcript
Our commencement ceremony today is not only to celebrate the hard work we’ve accomplished over the past four years, but to also celebrate my birthday and I’ll tell you, this is the largest party I’ve ever had, thanks UMass!
Every year, in commencement speech after commencement speech, we as graduating seniors are spoon-fed an endless plethora of canned quotes and platitudes from the podium.
To avoid that, I want to start this off by saying I am a janitor. I know that isn’t considered a glamorous job or what you expect to hear from someone about to graduate with an engineering degree but let me explain:
My name is Tejendra Patel. Five years ago, I had my life figured out. I knew which school I wanted to attend, and what I would study. I had acceptance letters from top engineering universities and a plan. But then life happened and I had to clean up after it; in this case literally with a mop and bucket, at my parent’s convenience store. My parents, who emigrated from India and came with nothing, worked hard to establish themselves as small business owners.
With the acceptance letters in hand, I tried to help my parents understand that graduating from a big name university results in better career opportunities and a high paying job. They looked at me with skepticism saying “If you have the talent, you don’t need a university stamp on your resume to be successful. It doesn’t matter which college you attend, if you don’t work hard, you’re not getting anywhere.” In my head I’m like, “you guys don’t understand, you just want me to work at the store keeping the floors clean and not party every night.” But jokes aside, I took what they said seriously.
Being a janitor means going beyond your job scope to tackle challenges ignored by others, allowing you to do the things you want to do in the future. Many, if not all of us had to go cleanup aisle ten at some point during our time at UMass. Doing jobs that aren’t necessarily glamorous or fun but required - required in order to achieve success later on. For some, that might mean working full time to put yourself through college. For others, that might mean rushing home after classes to take care of elderly parents or younger siblings.
Part of coming from an immigrant family meant constantly striving to better myself. It meant taking the initiative, even when it wasn’t easy. It was taking on the tasks that no one else wanted. Fortunately, attending UMass allowed me to support my family and get an excellent education. Every semester I juggled six courses while working at my parent’s business. Ever since freshman year I had an internship so I could grow my skill set beyond my comfort zone; I was a full stack developer, a performance engineer and a User Experience ninja.
I was hired at Nextdrift Technologies with the intention to never work on client projects - just to work on internal stuff here and there to help me get my foot in the door. It was yet another janitorial job this time cleaning up and fixing broken code. By taking the initiative to learn what was required at the time, I got promoted from an associate janitor to CJO - Chief Janitorial Officer; taking client projects from conception to reality. The experiences I gained by taking these initiatives made me more knowledgeable and skillful opening more opportunities.
Taking initiative is a quality shared by us Corsairs. Recently, a group of students in a sustainability class went beyond the scope of the syllabus to start the Hunger Initiative. Pursuing solutions to local and global hunger by creating a community garden near Cedar Dell. Students like Jacob Miller, for involvement in civic engagement initiatives, helping to create a cultural district in downtown New Bedford. The engineers from the IDEA club designing and building ROVs. And many other initiatives started by our peers. This is who we are. My parents’ words constantly remind me, “If you’ve got talent inside you, it’s fully within your power to nurture it.” You can improve individual skills if you’re willing to spend time. Most importantly, you’re not limited by what you are provided with, you are limited by what you think is possible. What I learned at UMass is that the opportunities are endless. We’ve all had people tell us what’s possible and not possible. What we can do and what we can’t do. And honestly, I think possible is a big word thrown around by insecure people to justify what they have in life is enough. Because it’s a whole lot easier to accept what’s given to you then to go out and make that difference to make your life by your design.
Every time we excel beyond what is required, it opens more opportunities even if there are other highly qualified candidates. There is no denying that there will always be someone who is better than you, smarter than you, someone who has better credentials, and more connections. You ruin your life when you compare yourself to others. So don’t be discouraged from achieving your wildest dreams; because you can’t lose what you don’t already have. And once you get that dream job or opportunity, go beyond the required to tackle challenges ignored by others.
We should pride ourselves with being able to identify a mess and cleaning it up without being told, regardless of the situation or circumstances. After all, the exact responsibilities of a janitor depend on the particular position and mess.
This isn’t a formal student commencement address; rather, it’s a toast at our graduation party. We are here because we made it. Ok. That was my first and last canned quote. Some of us, like myself, took more than four years; congratulations to the fifth years! Nevertheless, we did what we had needed to - to get where we are now.
Be happy where you are. Be grateful for where you are. But never settle for where you are.
Thank you!