Now The Fun Begins

It's graduation day at King's. For the students who have been preparing for this since they were juniors, it's an exciting time and they are ready to go. True, it may be an entry-level job waiting for them, but they know it's the start of a career. For others, they may be entering at a somewhat higher level; they worked hard for it and are ready for the challenges that will come shortly.

There's another group: those who have slid through doing the minimum work, blaming their profs, telling anyone who cares to listen that the school sucks. They haven't a clue. They are about to graduate (two hours and ten minutes from now, as I write this) and they've only lately looked around to see what's available. They'll find something; 95 or 98 percent of our grads find jobs right away. I'm not sure where and it's quite possible that these latter people might be wearing name badges for the first three years until they wake up. Either they'll be asking if the customer would like fries with that, or they will be asking if the customer would like the extended warranty. One way or another, in about five or so years, they will be kicking themselves for thinking that their four years after high school were just an extended underage party.

As soon as your hand touches the diploma, your fun days turn into a pumpkin, the glass slippers turn into work boots, the coach turns into a '95 Nova with 120k on it. Either you rub your hands together, smile with confidence and say, "Ok, let's go -- can't wait for the graduation party to finish so I can get to that new job," or you say, "Oh (bad word), now what the (another bad word) am I going to do?"

I know; it all works out. The beer-swillers get their act together, become moderately successful (if not more so) and, some years later, visit the campus and look down their noses at the students who are weaving down the lane. I met one such and said, "Want me to remind you of what you were like??" He laughed and said, "Forget it!"