Alumnus Mehul Sanghani shares advice with the Class of 2024
Mehul Sanghani ’98 delivered the keynote address at Virginia Tech’s University Commencement ceremony on Friday, May 10. He shared four key pieces of advice.
On Opportunity
“I ask that you seize the opportunity to lead. Seize the opportunities to address the challenges in front of you because much like the efforts that brought you into this chair today, I can assure you that previous generations won’t simply hand over the mantle of leadership and yield it to you. You have to earn that role. Earn it with the grace, perspective, and the intellect that your education has afforded you – the same skills that got you in that chair today.
Much like a boxer in a heavyweight fight, I challenge all of you to answer the bell of leadership needed to navigate these challenges to champion and seize a better future – a more peaceful future. If not for you all, then for who?
The chapters in your book are far from written. Go out and write them – and write them with the purpose and resolve that this great college has ingrained in you.”
On Regret and Gratitude
“My biggest regret is that my father isn’t here today to see me deliver this speech.
I know I’m not alone in my regrets though. I know that many of you – almost all of you in fact – probably have the ghost of regret. You all too have had loss. And I am here to tell you as a grown man and as an adult that you will certainly see loss after you leave here as graduates and enter the world, too.
What I don’t regret – I hope you don’t or won’t – are the lessons that have been shared. I don’t regret the opportunities that I have been provided or the sacrifices that have been made. It is instead with a sense of gratitude, and not the sentiment of regret or the pain of loss, that I’m grateful to have my mom here to see me give this talk today – just a few days before Mother’s Day – to hear me share this story of loss and gratitude. To hear me talk honestly and openly about pain and perspective.”
On Community
“Hokies, we’re a special breed of human being.
This is a community that has stuck together in the face of tragedy. It’s a community that rallies around its own and supports its own with a loyal ferocity that is unmatched. It’s a proud community that embodies the characteristics of its students – hard working and resilient. You are now apart of that very special community. You are now a part of a global community of people – a community of people that are very proud to call themselves Hokies. Your time here in Blacksburg is now in your blood. It’s seated in your bones.
So, I challenge you all to remember that affinity you have built for this community we call Virginia Tech. To bring this same humble enthusiasm for community to all the places over the globe that you will eventually call home. And to come back home to Blacksburg when your spirit needs its proper rekindling.”
On Ut Prosim
“To me it means those that are fortunate enough to reach the proverbial penthouse in life have a moral obligation to send that elevator of opportunity down to those that are clawing their way up. It’s offering up paths upward and not gatekeeping access to success levers and enablers that want that path up. In some cases, it means volunteering our time and not just dollars. And in other cases it means volunteering your unique expertise in your communities.
So my ask is simple: In the future, as you reflect on your time here, I humbly ask that you look to advance this concept of Ut Prosim. That you reflect on the benefit your time here has had on the trajectory of your life.
In the years to come, you will have ample opportunity to look back on your time here at Virginia Tech and make an objective assessment of the role that higher education has played in how you see the world and who you’ve become as a person. I hope that you have the same raw emotion for our school that I do. And I hope that you’ll embrace this concept of community – this concept of service, this concept of Ut Prosim – that’s a core part of what makes this school so very special, wherever the roads of life take you.”
