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- In addition to presenting him with an honorary degree,
it's also my great privilege to welcome Neil Van Dine
to serve as this year's principal commencement speaker.
Neil Van Dine's exemplary service to the people
of Haiti makes him an excellent choice
to address the graduates of Albright College
and we're most grateful for his presence here today.
Building on years of experiences,
he developed the innovative core methodology
of Haiti Outreach, combining technical expertise,
knowledge sharing, and leadership development
to create transformation and empower hundreds
of rural villages to manage their water supplies.
The concept of empowerment is vital
to Mr. Van Dine's organization.
Haiti Outreach is committed
to development rather than relief.
Development tackles the underlying causes
that prevent a community from moving forward,
while relief simply provides
the immediate assistance needed.
We are privileged to have such an esteemed figure
join us today, so ladies and gentlemen,
please join me in welcoming Neil Van Dine.
(all applaud)
- Thank you, Lex.
Thank you, President McMillan,
Albright trustees, faculty, friends, guests,
and members of the Albright family.
You know, I myself am a legacy.
56 years ago, my dad graduated from here in 1961.
I myself graduated in 1988.
About 20 years ago, in the middle of one
of the most unworkable, undeveloped countries in the world,
I watched my son being born.
I couldn't be prouder today to be here
and watch him walk across the stage, Ken Van Dine.
(audience applauds and cheers)
(Neil laughs)
I'm deeply honored to be here today
and speak to you as you begin a new adventure
in this wild ride called life.
I myself have lived some crazy adventures,
raised some amazing kids, and I love what I do.
The intention of my speech today is
to convey some small part of
what I have learned from life so far.
For me, it comes down to three simple things:
Do what you're passionate about,
build integrity in everything you do, and be generous.
When I say do what you're passionate about,
it means don't be afraid to take on something
that you love to do.
You'll ultimately be happier with that choice,
whether to become a lawyer, a doctor, a business owner,
missionary, actor, artist, or engineer,
find a job that you love and do it
with all the passion it deserves.
Quite often, doing what you're passionate about
will present significant challenges.
Sometimes those challenges are physical,
sometimes they're financial, and sometimes they're mental.
A year after graduating from Albright,
I found my passion in Haiti.
When I told my parents I was moving to Haiti to help,
my dad thought that was the worst idea in the world.
When I told him that, he said to me,
"You know, you don't know anybody there,
"you don't speak the language, you don't have any money.
"What in the world are you gonna do?"
His argument made perfect sense,
so of course I did it anyhow, moved to Haiti,
and eventually, as you heard,
founded a nonprofit organization called Haiti Outreach,
that today employs over 50 people and delivers water
to communities all over the country.
I don't pretend to say that I knew what I was doing,
but I did love it.
In one of the most unworkable countries in the world,
I was challenged to bring change,
to bring safe, clean water and transform this place,
so that Haiti could be a developed country.
Man, it was tough.
I can't kid you.
I worked 100-hour weeks for years with no money,
hours from the nearest phone, road, store, or civilization,
crossing flooded rivers, living through coups,
having malaria, typhoid, dengue fever, and you name it,
but at the same time, I was teaching, I was building,
and I screwed up a lot, and, by the way,
I brought water and education to hundreds
of thousands of people, and I had a blast doing it.
I've been fortunate to be able to do
what I'm passionate about
and change the world at the same time.
Back then, Haiti was the opposite
of nearly everything we know here in our modern world,
no infrastructure, no roads, no electricity,
no schools, no banks, no communications.
That made this country extremely vulnerable to a host
of natural disasters, earthquakes, hurricanes, floods.
We've seen all this in the news about Haiti.
Sometimes thinking about solving all these problems
can be very intimidating.
When things are intimidating, there's very little we can do
to move ourselves into action and change that future,
but what does create action is envisioning a future,
rolling up your sleeves, and getting to work to create it.
Today, I have a story about a community
in Haiti that did just that.
"Where do you get the water," the doctor asked.
Madame Elima Augustin was a woman living
in a village called Sayan with nine children,
kids who had been sick most of the time.
She had already lost one child to cholera when he was 18,
and now three more were severely ill.
She was standing in the clinic in front of the doctor
who was treating these three kids,
and the doctor repeated, "Where do you get your water?"
Madame Elima responded that she sent her kids to the river
for all of the water that they used in the house.
That's what her family had done for generations.
Now she learned from the doctor that they were all sick
because they had been drinking contaminated water.
At that moment, Madame Elima created a new future
in her mind, a future where her family
would only drink clean water.
That wasn't very easy for her, but from that day forward,
she walked miles to secure and buy clean water
for her family to drink.
One day, on her way to market, she passed by a new well,
where people were drinking clean water.
She immediately sought out the people who were responsible
for the well, and they told her
that that well had been created by Haiti Outreach,
and that her village could also have one
if they contacted the local mayor's office.
Well, when she realized the possibility of having a well
for her village, she began working tirelessly
to create that future, working with her neighbors
for months to figure out how to manage the well,
find out how many people lived in her village,
and educating them on the importance
of clean water and sanitation.
The day that rig showed up to drill,
the entire village watched as this amazing machine created
a hole in the ground that promised to connect them
to a future with clean water.
Unfortunately, after a couple days of drilling,
the hole was dry, and the rig moved on
to the next community, leaving the village
of Sayan devastated and heartbroken.
All that work lost,
but Madame Elima Wasn't having any of this.
She saw the future that she wanted for her family,
and she went out and enrolled the rest
of the village elders into another possibility,
that this group traveled halfway across the country
to visit the Haiti Outreach office and convinced our team
to try a second time and find water for them.
They walked for miles to the nearest road,
riding in trucks and public transportation,
switching from city to city, fording rivers,
fighting broken-down vehicles,
and eventually arriving at our office,
right after it closed.
Talk about having challenges in front of you,
but we wound up housing them that night,
and in the morning, a very enthusiastic Madame Elima
and the village elders convinced our team to try again.
A month later, the village celebrated the opening
of the first source of clean water in their history.
The powerful future created by one woman changed the lives
of an entire village.
Passion, integrity, and generosity.
What does it mean to have integrity?
I have another story, about a village of Mayaya,
that had worked hard to create their well.
For months, they worked to build a budget and enroll people
to pay a small fee for the access to clean water.
They made sure that every home had a latrine.
As a result, their village was getting healthier,
fewer people were getting sick,
and the children had stopped dying.
They were proud of what they had created.
They had maintained this well for years now,
working with the mayor and the judge
to ensure that everyone was aligned
with the management plan they had created.
The well had integrity, their management had integrity,
everything was working.
Then the election came along,
and a local candidate for Congress was seeking votes.
Well, he came upon this nice, managed well
that looked so nice, and he decided that he could gain votes
if he made the water free for everybody.
He took his gun, and in front of the entire committee,
shot the lock off the well,
destroying the management integrity of the well
in one fell swoop.
Well, the committee was horrified
and realized that their clean water supply was at risk.
With no way to generate revenue,
they would be unable to repair it when it broke.
Their water supply now had no integrity.
This wasn't at all how they promised to manage the well.
It wasn't at all the future that they had created.
While the water flowed freely,
the water committee went first to the mayor,
then to the judge, creating an arrest warrant
for the culprit.
They then called us and asked us to be present at the trial,
in order to support their role in managing the well,
but when this candidate saw that he was the source
of things not working, that the entire village had turned
against him, he apologized, repaired the lock on his own.
Integrity restored.
Passion, integrity, and generosity.
How does generosity fit in here?
Well, all these stories have created
in Haiti are all made possible by the generosity of people,
from the villagers donating their time to create
and manage this infrastructure, to the donors
who allow us to keep building water supplies.
Generosity is what's created these stories you heard today.
Generosity is Albright faculty, administrators,
and students giving up their spring break to create a well
for a village in Haiti.
Generosity is Albright creating and hosting a Walk
for Water, to provide yet another village with a well.
Generosity is the promise of Albright College
to meet 100% of the financial needs
of every student attending the school.
Generosity is my parents supporting my efforts in Haiti,
even though it was the worst idea ever.
Generosity is a sister taking in her brother's kids
from Haiti so that they could have an education.
Generosity is friends from 30 years ago driving hours
to come hear me speak today.
A friend of mine shared a poem with me.
It was written almost 100 years ago
by a guy named Edgar Guest.
To me, it really captures what I've spoken about
in a powerful way.
"It couldn't be done."
"Somebody said that it couldn't be done,
but he with a chuckle replied,
that maybe it couldn't, but he would be one
who wouldn't say so 'til he tried.
So he buckled right in with a trace of a grin
on his face; if he worried, he hid it.
He started to sing as he tackled the thing
that couldn't be done, and he did it.
Somebody scoffed, "Oh, you'll never do that,
"at least no one has ever done it,"
but he took off his coat and he took off his hat,
and the first thing we knew, he'd begun it.
With a lift of his chin and a bit of a grin,
without any doubting or quiddit,
he started to sing as he tackled the thing
that couldn't be done, and he did it.
There are thousands to tell you it cannot be done;
there are thousands to prophesy failure.
There are thousands to point out to you, one by one,
the dangers that wait to assail you,
but just buckle in with a bit of a grin,
just take off your coat and go to it.
Just start in to sing as you tackle the thing
that cannot be done, and you'll do it."
29 years ago, I sat right where you guys are,
worried about my future.
How would I find a job?
Should I go to grad school?
What am I gonna do with my life?
I wound up working in Haiti, a place
where everyone tells me, "It cannot be done,"
so I rolled up my sleeves and I did it.
You know, future can be scary,
especially when it's a future that we don't create.
If we don't create a future of our own,
we'll always be living into a future
that someone else has created for us.
We come out of college highly educated,
but at the same time, vastly unprepared for life.
Most of us haven't learned that we are responsible
for creating our future that we want to live into.
When we can understand that our future is not dictated
by our past, everything becomes possible.
In closing, I have one last paraphrase
from a poem by Mary Oliver.
Tell me what is it you plan to do
with your one wild and precious life.
To this I say, I will do what I'm passionate about,
build integrity in everything I do, and be generous.
Thank you.
(all applaud)
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