Ohio University Professor Thomas Vander Ven delivers the Commencment Address during Graduate Commencement on Friday, May 1, 2015. Vander Ven was the 2014 Outstanding Graduate Faculty Award Winner. Photo by Ohio University / Rob Hardin
From Compass
“It’s a little horrifying,” joked Commencement speaker Thomas Vander Ven during the May 1 Graduate Commencement at Ohio University. “I’m live in concert at The Convo.”
Vander Ven had the graduates laughing as he delivered one-liners and his Top Eight pieces of advice:
- Tell your mentors what they meant to you—and know what you meant to them.
- Get to know your academic tree and academic ancestors.
- Recognize that your mentors changed your life and you changed theirs.
- Get a sense of the ideas and values passed down to you and make a plan to pass them down to others.
- Keep in touch with your academic family because they are a great source of social capital.
- If you feel like you don’t have an academic family, start one. Raise someone up.
- Go out and do great things that make your academic and Ohio University families proud.
- Finally, remember that we are here if you need us, and we are really going to miss you.
Vander Ven, Professor of Sociology in the Ohio University College of Arts & Sciences, was the 2014 Outstanding Graduate Faculty Member. The Outstanding Graduate Faculty Award was established in 1972 to recognize a professor who has demonstrated exemplary performance as an instructor, researcher and faculty member. One of the perks of winning the award is serving as the Graduate Commencement speaker the following year.
Vander Ven told the audience that it was a great honor to receive this distinction and a tremendous opportunity to give the Graduate Commencement address. He admitted that he was a little nervous because he was asked to give an inspirational speech in eight minutes.
To get ideas for his speech, Vander Ven said he Googled “inspirational commencement addresses,” which cracked up the audience.
“This was a big mistake,” he laughed.
He said he did learn that Steve Jobs, the late founder and CEO of Apple Inc., once gave an inspirational commencement address at Stanford University where he told the audience that he built the first Apple computer in his garage when he was 20 years old.
“Amazing,” Vander Ven said. “Currently, I’m too afraid to go in my garage. We treat it like a dumpster and I think there’s a raccoon family living there. My story is much different than his.”
Vander Ven said his professional story is pretty simple. He said he owes everything to the social support, social capital and the love, guidance and mentoring he received from his academic family.
“Sociologist Peggy Thoits defines social support as emotional, informational, practical assistance from significant others, such as family, friends or coworkers,” Vander Ven said. “It is generally regarded as a positive resource. Most of you are here because someone believed in you. Who is that person?”
Vander Ven told the graduates that all of them can picture that person who saw their potential and nurtured it.
“Some collaborated with you in a way that changed your life and yes, it changed their life too,” Vander Ven said. “That’s the thing about social support – it’s mutually beneficial. It’s good for the giver and the receiver.”
He said a recent study of this concept found that giving social support is more beneficial than receiving it. He said the givers in the study were found to live longer, have less stress, have better physical and mental health and be generally happier.
“People with a social support network allow themselves to take calculated, pro-social risks because we know there will be someone there to catch us if we fall,” Vander Ven said. “It is no accident that nations with institutionalized social support have less crime and better health.”
He told the graduates that they are all products of a tremendous amount of social support. He told them that they are a product of centuries of mentoring.
“Who raised you and have you told them what they meant to you?” Vander Ven said. “For me, working with students has been the greatest single joy of my career. Whatever positive impact I’ve had on my students will live forever through the magic of accumulative mentoring.”
Vander Ven told the graduates that he was excited for them because they get to mentor someone. He said they shouldn’t see it as an obligation, but rather a way to share their passions with others. He left the students with some last advice.
“Number one is you can build a computer in your garage,” Vander Ven joked.
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