University of Pittsburgh at Bradford graduates were “champions”
of the stage at their graduation Sunday afternoon in the Sports and
Fitness Center.
Joetta Clark-Diggs, the guest speaker at graduation, was a
four-time Olympian and one of America’s premier middle distance
runners for more than three decades. The 800-meter runner has
competed in every outdoor USA Championship or Olympic trials since
1979, winning more than nine championship titles. She has been
ranked among the top 10 in America for more than 20 years.
Her address to the graduates interestingly comes almost exactly
10 years after her father, Joe Clark, who is known as the principal
who transformed a drug-ridden inner-city school in New Jersey and
subject of the film “Lean on Me,” gave Pitt-Bradford’s commencement
address on April 27, 1996.
Clark-Diggs recognized graduates Sunday for their hard work,
dedication, determination, discipline and focus over the years to
get to graduation day. She encouraged the graduates to continue to
stay focused and be motivated, telling the story of a dog that
moaned and groaned while it was sitting on a nail that wasn’t
hurting him bad enough to get up.
“You have to find something that hurts bad enough to get you
motivated to achieve something,” Clark-Diggs said.
She told the graduates they will find “force winds” and “true
enemies” in the world, but that “failure is not an option. It is
only a nagging reality.” She encouraged the graduates not to let
people drag them down.
“All the water in the world cannot sink a boat unless it gets
in,” she said. “People favor underdogs but follow top dogs.
“You will find if you don’t stand for something, you will fall
for everything,” Clark-Diggs added. “Plant a garden of success as
you go through life….If you nourish this garden, it will harvest
something that will mean something.”
Besides her Olympic career, Clark-Diggs is also president of her
own consulting business, Joetta Sports & Beyond, and has worked
for some of the top athlete-oriented businesses in the world,
including Footlocker, Powerfood and Nike. She also delivers
high-energy motivational seminars to athletic programs, businesses
and other organizations across the country. She also helped fight
against drugs as a special investigator in the New Jersey Attorney
General’s Office, Drug Diversion Section.
Clark-Diggs earned a full athletic scholarship to and graduated
from the University of Tennessee.
She said one of the questions that people tend to ask her since
she was an Olympian is “how many gold medals do you have?” She
answers, “I never got a gold medal in the Olympics, but I have a
gold medal of life,” citing her accomplishments in education and
business.
“You now are champions,” Clark-Diggs told the graduates. “You
all have these eyes on you as you get your gold medal. The
difference between an orange and a grapefruit is the orange had
opportunity and took it. What matters most in life is that you
always try. When one door closes, another should open. The world is
waiting for you to show up. Why? Because you’re all champions.”
Also at graduation, McKean County President Judge John Cleland
received the Presidential Medal of Distinction, the university’s
highest honor recognizing the contributions of those people
associated with Pitt-Bradford and those connected with the
college’s service region.
“The purpose of education is not to get a good job and make a
lot of money,” Cleland said. “We all hope that will be the result
of your education. The purpose of an education is to enable us to
live lives of joy and satisfaction and to appreciate the world we
live in.
“If you graduates are able to do these things – to live your
life with passion about the problems of your day, with awe and
wonder at the complexities of the natural world, with a sense of
what it could mean for you and for all humanity to know what it is
to love and to be loved – if you can live your lives in a way that
you find pleasure and treasure and hope in the most unexpected
places … then those of us fortunate enough to have worn this (the
Presidential Medal of Distinction) will know we truly have done
something meaningful.”
Cleland, of Kane, has been a member of the advisory board at
Pitt-Bradford since 1984 and served as its chairman from 1995 to
2005. During his tenure as advisory board chairman, the university
accomplished much, hitting a handful of milestones in areas such as
development, enrollment and facilities. He has been president judge
for the county since Oct. 5, 1984.
A large class of about 227 graduates were recognized this year,
and Dr. Livingston Alexander, president of the university,
specially recognized Naomi Carlson, 75, “whose journey to the stage
today took 30 years … because she was busy building a very
successful career in her own right.”
