http://www.michigandaily.com/news/sanjay-gupta-commencement-speaker
The guy grew up in Novi, went to Michigan for undergrad and medical school, and got to warm up for the Big House speech with his 2009 address to the UMich medical school graduates. He was also pegged to be the Surgeon General by my commencement speaker, Barack Obama, before declining due to family considerations.
Thoughts?
Big name
Yeah
Yeah and his holocaust jokes did not go over well at all.
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“ The best way to predict the future is to invent it.” — Alan Kay
You're saying Gupta is
godzillaWax?
"I love him, he's a great coach, he's a great mentor, he's a great friend. He's every single thing you want a college coach to be, and he does it flawlessly." -David Molk
Seems like a good guy, I
Seems like a good guy, I liked that segment he did on 60 Minutes last night.
Def choice!
Robin Meade is eye candy,tho.
Lucky enough to have my own JT wristband!!
1997 speaker - Lee Bollinger
The graduates in my class got absolutely screwed. No offense to Mr. Bollinger but I wouldn't sit through 5 minutes of him speaking even if he paid me. EVen if he's not a great speaker, Dr. Sanja blows Bollinger out of the water.
Disgruntled former moderator. I got a lot of problems with you people!
It could've been worse. You
It could've been worse. You could have graduated in 2011 with Rick Snyder or from the Law School with Senator Rob Portman. The former had several students sit backwards in protest and the latter had several students skip or walk out of their commencement.
No kidding. All politics
No kidding. All politics aside, Snyder's speech was awful. To have 2010 and 2012 feature Obama and Gupta, respectively is very frustrating when we (the class of 2011) had to sit through Snyder's speech.
I'm not sure I agree.
Obama's speech was good, but attendees that year were treated to a cringe-worthy speech from Jennifer Granholm right before his. I didn't attend graduation last year, but that was quite possibly the worst and most embarrassing speech I've ever witnessed in person.
Granholm was definitely
Granholm was definitely kissing up to the POTUS in an attempt to curry favor for a Supreme Court Justice position in 2010.
She did, however, come to a Student Dems rally in the Union in 2008 and did a wonderful job speaking and pumping up the students.
The Class of 2011 got screwed
The Class of 2011 got screwed because your class brought The Horror. Gov. Snyder was your punishment.
University of Tom Brady, B.A. '10; University of Peyton Manning, J.D. '13.
Don't we get anything at least
for ending the NCAA tournament drought and finally beating Ohio? (the fifth-years were our recruiting Class of '07)
At hostes, pol, perniciter eant εις κοράκας
If anything that speaks to
If anything that speaks to the immaturity of the "graduates". Strangely, there are people who have different views out there and sometimes (oh heavens!) you have to listen to them. Trying to not get political, but there have been well known political speakers from every stripe and those students simply embarrassed themselves and Michigan. Maybe they could have used another civics class before they graduated.
What you see is the hard work he's put in. It's nature. It just all comes together.
-Craig James
Old Bush
My year, '91, was pretty bad. We had George Bush The Elder, who gave a speech based on "The Great Society" which was not even remotely relevant to anybody sitting in the audience. Then right afterward he had a heart attack and went to Bethesda Naval Hospital for treatment. All his speech did was basically give the student protesters a last chance to be obnoxious, which wasn't terribly impressive either. This was especially frustrating since the rumor going around was that we could've had James Earl Jones, which would've been cool. I mean, who would've cared what he said? Just the voice! [Insert deep voice] This Is U of M {instead of CNN}
Political speakers
I think in general, national political speakers with little or no ties to UM are bad speakers. The political profile of the person makes it so ~50% of the audience doesn't really want to hear the speach, and the immature of those 50% will do something to embarrass themselves and the school. Also, the fact that they don't have ties to UM usually gives them the impression they can get up and use the face time for their political agenda. I think students fall in love with the "big name" too much. I think having a UM grad that has done something worthwhile outside of the public political sector is the way to go.
"A flute with no holes is not a flute. A donut with no hole is a danish"
That's a fair
That's a fair point...would seem to make Gupta a good choice. UM ties, smart guy, and has his head screwed on straight.
Hopefully he rises to the occasion.
I think hes a good pick
According to a couple friends in the med school at the time he gave the med commencement speech, he was a little too proud himself (if you know what I mean), but nonetheless, I think thats the kind of guy that makes for a good speaker. Larry Page was the best I've heard.
"A flute with no holes is not a flute. A donut with no hole is a danish"
Exactly.
I was there watching a bunch of my friends graduate. I thought his speech was pretty good (if a little self-agrandizing). He should be a fine speaker, not the best ever, but totally appropriate.
Yes, I am a girl.
I don't know that you can have a sitting President and complain.
Now, if you had Cathy Guisewite as your speaker, I feel for you.
"I love him, he's a great coach, he's a great mentor, he's a great friend. He's every single thing you want a college coach to be, and he does it flawlessly." -David Molk
It was a terrible,
It was a terrible, uninspiring speech. Just because it was from the president doesn't mean it didn't suck.
Cathy
My buddies that graduated the year she spoke were f-ing livid about that choice. They told their parents not to bother coming to town because they weren't attending the commencement. Hahaha.
Disgruntled former moderator. I got a lot of problems with you people!
They didn't embarass me or my degree
I am proud of them for peacefully protesting in a simple but powerful way... and I voted for snyder.
We are the dead.
You had Bollinger, I had...
...Jim Duderstadt and we was truly awful.
We both had the unfortunate timing of graduating in the first year of a new president's tenure. I wonder if MSC broke the chain of crappy commencement addresses for new presidents.
Class of '03?
Beyond this, the list of other persons receiving honorary degrees is quite impressive, especially when you see how many of them are U-M alumni. Everyone (I think) knows about Chris Van Allsburg's relationship with Michigan, but I wasn't aware that Susan Orlean is an alumna. She was all the rage when Adaptation came our a few years ago. More importantly, non-alumnus, but U-M business partner and donor Richard Sarn is originally from The Clem. Who knew?
LSA '89 - MBB Natl Champions, Big 10/Rose Bowl Champions | @MGoShoe
I was in the class of '03.
I was in the class of '03. Jennifer Granholm delivered the address. It wasn't too memorable.
Perhaps MSC would have been...
...better than Granholm. Still, it's a good thing that they seem to have done away with the tradition of a new University President delivering the commencement address in his/her first year in office.
And I'll say this about Duderstadt's address. 23 years later, it seems much better in print than it did in delivery. I'll chalk up my disappointment to the follies and poor perspective of youth.
LSA '89 - MBB Natl Champions, Big 10/Rose Bowl Champions | @MGoShoe
'05 speaker from Xerox
'05 speaker from Xerox read from his notes the entire speech and never seemed to look up. I think everyone in the stadium was cold and bored. Thankfully the next year Chrisitane Amanpour delivered a kickass speech to a standing ovation.
Kate Upton wasn't available?
Kate Upton wasn't available?
Except for the other thing. That hurts the most. But the lack of respect hurts the second most.
He is not on my top 20 list
He is not on my top 20 list of alumni speakers. But he is a "name" so I guess U-M got what it wanted.
Mary Markley
Let's not forget that Dr. Gupta ably represents Mary Markley Hall from the early 90's!! He was a nattily-dressed Resident Director that seemed to have 26 hours of dedicated non-sleep activity per day. I was terribly impressed with him then and am not surprised at all with his success.
FYI...he also just published a novel in his spare time: http://www.usatoday.com/life/books/news/story/2012-03-12/sanjay-gupta-mo...
More importantly, he was a
More importantly, he was a member of the University of Michigan Men's Glee Club back in the day.
well that's the least
well that's the least surprising thing i've heard all day
RIP my avatar, June 14, 1998 - October 26, 2012.
A round of snaps
to you sir, and +100 Alumni Points
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Can't be worse than 1988
I can't recall the speaker's name from my commencement because I was fairly hammered, but I remember it was long and boring. He was booed more than once and also had a group stand and turn their back to him.
Cool story, eh?
no
Not a cool story, bro.
Marshall D Shulman -
Marshall D Shulman - Professor of International Studies and Advanced Study of the Soviet Union.
It's a cooler story now because I don't care how learned you are, that speaker stunk.
I graduated in 1988 as well.
I graduated in 1988 as well. In addition to the HORRIBLE speaker, Jeanne Kirkpatrick was given an honorary degree. It was all a rather crazy experience, apparently. I just don't remember all these details.... but here are a couple posts on the subject. (H/T MGoUser SAvoodoo, who found these for me 2 years ago when a "who was your speaker" thread came up.)
Editorial in the NY Times:
http://www.nytimes.com/1988/05/06/opinion/the-editorial-notebook-a-class-of-88.html?pagewanted=1
Commentary from another 1988 grad. You have to scroll down nearly to the end, and look for 2 posts by "cheryl cassidy".
http://emutalk.org/2008/01/uofm-will-hold-graduation-at-emu-stadium/
Way to go...
...dude. That was Nobel laureate and Poet Laurate of the United States Joseph Brodsky, a Soviet dissident poet who spent 8 yrs in Ann Arbor in two stints at U-M. Here's the address you and your classmates didn't like.
Edit: I take it back. Brodsky did winter 1988. You booed the right guy apparently.
LSA '89 - MBB Natl Champions, Big 10/Rose Bowl Champions | @MGoShoe
Thanks!
Thanks for the link to Joseph Brodsky's speech. I read it and it was very moving.
I agree with...
...your evaluation. Now that was a man who loved A2 and U-M for all of the right reasons - that is, the city and university permitted the sort of freedom of thought and action that wasn't afforded to him while living in a police state. I especially liked his description of a democratic state: "...this halfway house between nightmare and uptopia -- which throws fewer obstacles in the way of an individual than its alternatives".
LSA '89 - MBB Natl Champions, Big 10/Rose Bowl Champions | @MGoShoe
Agree. Awful.
That was my graduation too.. Even the parents started to get rude.
They Stuck Me with Otis Smith
Because of a Spring Term program I decided to attend senior year, I missed Lee Iacocca with the rest of my class. Instead, at a stifling hot August commencement in Hill Auditorium, I got a boring speech from Otis Smith, a former GM exec and Michigan Supreme Court Justice. It was so boring, it was the last August Commencement ever.
Meanwhile, my wife got Walter Cronkite the next year.
Here is a nice list of all of the commencement addresses at UM since 1878. It even has links to the text of most speeches, but not any for the last 20 years. (copyright??)
For the most part, doctors
For the most part, doctors are awful public speakers.
'Good' public talks by doctors almost always include gory slides to keep an audience awake.
Unless Dr. Gupta has pictures of the burr-holes he drilled to evacuate subdural hematomas in the field to earn his honorary 'Devil-Doc' status put on the Jumb-O-Tron , I predict one boring-ass speech.
And yes, I'm a doctor so I know first-hand how bad of a public speaker I can be, and I've had to endure dozens and dozens of speeches at conferences, commencements, etc. by docs.
Many academic doctors are
Many academic doctors are very engaging. Their careers are predicated upon selling their research and ideas to others. Granted, their audience is certainly different from the general public, but not all doctors are terrible public speakers. Clinicians, maybe.
I imagine Dr. Gupta, with all of his media exposure, has become an excellent public speaker (I don't watch real world news to actually know). Overall, not the most exciting speaker, but he is a Michigan man, and probably someone all the pre-meds will get a chub for.
Except for the other thing. That hurts the most. But the lack of respect hurts the second most.
Lame.
Lame. But maybe because I actually know the guy.
neoavatara.com/blog
Hate that guy,
have to see him pretty frequently working for CNN, since they apparently love to have him on. Total diva, full of himself. He also is a total creeper, trying to hit on every woman at CNN (makeup artists, cafe lady).
All of which may be true....
...but calling a dude a creeper with that avatar is....interesting...
Unless that is in fact you, in which case....welcome.
"I love him, he's a great coach, he's a great mentor, he's a great friend. He's every single thing you want a college coach to be, and he does it flawlessly." -David Molk
*sigh*
Been wondering who they were going to get. Given that the previous three were Larry Page, the President, and the Governor, I can't say I was expecting much though, so in light of that, I'll take it.
At least my class won't have to deal with all the griping the last two classes did. Inviting a political figure makes the opposite side act like children, and it really showed the last two years. I don't care whether you agree with Obama or Snyder or not; they are an important figure that's taking the time to come speak at your graduation ceremony, and you should be at least respectful of that fact.
Regardless of name though, not much of anybody gives a good graduation speech. Page's wasn't that good, Obama's frankly wasn't all that great, and while I did not listen to Snyder's, I have heard it wasn't great, and having heard him speak before, I know he's only a so-so speaker (which, I imagine, is why he likes town-hall style so much).
"Good evening, and welcome to Michigan Stadium for this the one-hundred thirty-second season of Michigan football, and the thirty-ninth meeting between Michigan and Notre Dame." -Carl Grapentine, September 10, 2011
Larry Page has the distinct
Larry Page does have the distinction of being the only speaker to declare the nearby location of his conception during his address. (a co-op on campus where his parents met)
Edit: I'm labeled as OT in my OT thread. Hm.
hmmmmm...
Based on Twitter it seems like Braylon's got quite a lot to say and he has current availability...
If the haters don't hate you then you're doing something wrong. - David Cone
I've never understood why
I've never understood why Michigan alumnus James Earl Jones isn't contracted to be the commencement speaker EVERY year.
He gave a relatively underwhelming address at the medical school graduation a few years ago.