Chancellor Mullarkey, President Steinberg, Provost Forestell, honored guests; deans and faculty; family and supporters; and above all, members of the class of 2009 … con gra tulations.

I'll start by saying, I am at a loss for words at this honor. The phrase “humbly grateful” seems puny in describing what I'm feeling.

I have two last assignments for you before you actually can leave this institution. I would like the members of the Class of 2009 to stand up please, salute their parents and friends and supporters they have here and send them your love.

The second assignment I have for you is to use those cell phones that I know you have and I know you haven't turned off… and send a message to your favorite staff member here at the University. Their phones won't be on but that's ok, they'll get their messages anyway.

While those text messages may be fleeting, my biggest challenge today is to give you a message that you might remember. Something that might last on your hard drive even if it crashes during your celebrations later on today. I thought I would start with a reason for you all to have hope … especially those of you who might not have completely figured out what you're going to do with the rest of your lives….

You can take heart from my own story. When I got my degree here in 1977, there was no way I could have envisioned a path to becoming an internet archaeologist and anthropologist like I am today.

The year I got my degree, the Crazy Eddie's at Roosevelt Field did not stock items called personal computers. They were still being hand-assembled by geeks in California .

Neither did Crazy Eddie's carry the new mobile phones that were coming onto commercial market in Japan .

But then there is the real tomorrow-land that I could have never imagined. In 1977, computer networks run on wires were still seven years into my future….

A lovely string of computer code called the World Wide Web was 12 years over the horizon.

… instant messaging was 19 years away

… iPods were 25 years off

… MySpace was 26 years off

…… and … for the 1977 me … YouTube was 29 years into the unknown.

I point all this out in order to convince you of the truth of a wonderful idea promoted by rhythm and blues philosopher, Sam Cooke… “Change is Gonna Come.”

You will see a lot of it, but you can't anticipate all of it. So … what are you gonna do about it?

I thought I would use as my structure for my talk today an idea that developed this winter on Facebook. It became popular in Facebook in the notes section to post “25 Random Things About Me” …How many of you did that? And then invite invite your Facebook friends to do “25 Random Things” about them and their factoids.

So, I want to rip off that idea and tell you “25 Random Things About You” and your peers … and how they might help you march into your future.

Here we go …

Random Thing Number One About You is that your generation is bigger. Random thing Number 2 is that it is more racially and ethnically diverse than any generation in America 's history, including Baby Boomers. When you add in the likely immi gra tion that is yet to come, your generation may get to 100 million people, compared with the 75 million Baby Boomers or so, that there are.

There are those who worry that a more diverse population poses cultural problems for our country. But thanks to the fact, random thing number 3, that you are the most aggressive and eager social networkers in the history of the world, this diversity thing could work out really well for you.

There is abundant medical and sociological research showing that people with big, diverse social networks are healthier, happier, and better off economically than those with smaller, more homogeneous networks.

So, you just have to follow your own instincts to reap the advantages of networking …. because you, the college-educated Millennials, are the most racially and socially tolerant cohort in history. That's Things 4 and 5.

So, keep cultivating new friends as well as staying with the buddies you made here. You get extra credit if your new friends have a different skin color, speak a different language, were born in a different generation, or come from a different socio-economic class.

And I'll make that extra-credit angle Random Thing No. 6 about you. Your generation is more achievement-oriented, grade-conscious, and rule-observant than your parents' or your gra ndparents' generation. You get extra credit for being in less trouble with the law than your predecessors and for having fewer social and emotional problems... (Those are Random Things 7, 8, and 9). Moreover, there are a lot more of you entering college and gra duating, as we see today, than were your elders … that's random thing 10.

Now, let's circle back for just a minute to the social networks stuff. You seem to have struck a really nice balance in your social networks between what sociologists call “strong ties” (the people, and friends and family who would do anything for you and are really close to you) and your “weak ties” (the people who you have a looser connection to).

Random Thing 11 is that you are more likely than your elders to say that a parent, a teacher or a mentor is your role model. You clearly honor your strong ties in a lovely, traditional way.

At the same time, you serve your “weak ties” by performing voluntary activities at staggering rates, which is Random Thing 12 … perhaps that's because you were the first generation to have “community service” requirements imposed on you by your school districts….which is Random Thing 13... but it's still a good thing.

Whatever the reason, you have taken the call to civic engagement seriously and last year translated it into record-shattering voting numbers in the election … that's Random Thing 14.

Most surprising of all though, to Baby Boomers, is that you showed us what a REAL generation gap can look like. Your disproportionate support for Barack Obama created the largest disparity in voting between young voters and others in the history of modern polling. That's Random Thing 15.

Numbers 16-23 all relate to technology. You and your peers are much more likely than your elders to:

•  own gaming consoles and play video games

•  text message

•  have an MP3 player like an iPod and download music

•  use instant messaging

•  create an avatar and interact with other people in virtual worlds

•  upload pictures and videos to the internet

•  to blog

•  and to participate in online social networks

And that leads me to Random Thing 24: You are record-breaking multitaskers as you toggle back and forth between all the screens in your life.

I have a friend named Linda Stone who worries about this: She thinks you live your lives in a state of what she calls “continuous partial attention” and she believes this adds to your stress levels because you are always kind of “on alert” and always interrupt-able.

I confess to being worried about another symptom of frenzied multitasking: Is all of this connectivity making it harder for you to enjoy simply being by yourself and thinking quietly for yourself?

The “vaccine” for continuous partial attention and too-much-connectedness is developing an appreciation for solitude and how it can center you and help you enjoy the company of yourself.

Unplug and try it every once in a while, you'll probably like it.

Still, even as I hope that you cultivate a taste for quiet contemplation, there is no denying the magic that many of you make when you share your digital stories and creations.

The 25 th random thing about you is that you are giving birth to a new kind of culture that is more vibrant because it has an explosion of new voices; fresh forms of music; novel kinds of language; varied pathways to community-building; new kinds of ethic and etiquette; and far-out – sometimes pretty twisted – forms of humor.

I would hope as you are uploading your creations and leaving giant digital footprints, you are conscious that this material all becomes part of the gospel of you … visible and inviting judgment from others. A gospel doesn't necessarily have to be religious. It used to mean, just telling a “good tale.”

So, by all means, use these technologies to create good tales and gra nd gospels of you.

And please take time to upload a couple of reminders of this day at this place.

Please remember that your gospel and this university's are now linked. I hope you cherish the connection as much as we all cherish you.

Thank you and congratulations.

See http://www.prb.org/Articles/2007/NewGenerationGap.aspx

See http://www.prb.org/Articles/2007/NewGenerationGap.aspx

See http://www.pewinternet.org/Reports/2009/Adults-and-Social-Network-Websites.aspx and http://www.pewinternet.org/Reports/2007/Teens-and-Social-Media.aspx

See http://people-press.org/report/300/a-portrait-of-generation-next and Andrew Kohut 's convocation remarks, February 22, 2009.

Howe, Neil, William Strauss, and R.J. Matson, Millennials Rising: The Next Generation, Vintage Press. 2000

Ibid.

See http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_qa3955/is_200404/ai_n9383887/

See http://people-press.org/report/300/a-portrait-of-generation-next

Zukin, Cliff, Scott Keeter, Molly Andolia, Krista Jenkins and Michael X. Delli Carpini, A New Engagement? Political Participation,Civic Life, and the Changing American Citizen, Oxford University Press. 2006

See http://www.civicyouth.org/PopUps/FactSheets/FS_youth_Voting_2008.pdf

See http://pewresearch.org/pubs/1031/young-voters-in-the-2008-election

See http://www.pewinternet.org/Reports/2009/Generations-Online-in-2009.aspx

See http://www.kff.org/entmedia/entmedia030905nr.cfm