 And welcome everybody to the celebration of our 2022 and 2023 graduates. And I think an especially warm welcome to those graduates from our MLIS program, our MARA program, our Informatics program, our Teacher Librarian program, and our most recent degree, Bachelor of Science in Information Science and Data Analytics. You all worked very hard and earned your degree and it's no small feat, as I know you all had a lot of other things going on in your life. And now with that, I'd like to pass it over to our Master of Ceremony, Dr. Anthony Chao, the School of Information Director. Thank you very much, Linda. And again, we appreciate all of your hard work and commitment in making all of this a success. Good evening. My name is Anthony Chao, the Director of the School of Information at San Jose State. First of all, to our graduates in the Class of 2022 and 2023, my hearty congratulations on your graduation and significant accomplishment and milestone that you have achieved tonight. We're extremely proud of you. I also want to share that tonight reflects an iSchool first and significant moment in our history, our first ever graduates with the Bachelor's in Information Science and Data Analytics. Congratulations to all of you. The SJSU iSchool continues to be the largest and one of the most influential iSchools in the nation. We're projected to grow by 5 to 10 percent in the fall, and this year's class will move us to close to 12,000 graduates in 49 states nationally. For the MLS degree over the past two years, we represented 13 percent of all of the nation's MLS candidates, and we're also number one in all racial categories, both in terms of total number of students, as well as the total percentage of those students nationally. This includes 36 percent of all MLS candidates that classify as Hispanic and Latino nationally. Quite an achievement. To all our graduates tonight, 375 this semester and 758 for the entire academic year, we raise our glasses in celebration of you. Go forward and help people work hard and be successful in both your personal and professional lives. Never forget that you've joined close to 12,000 SJSU iSchool alumni worldwide and will also always be here for you if you need us. I'm sad to say I've got a coffee mug to salute you, so cheers to all of our graduates. Using your reactions icon, let's also give a loud virtual applause to all of our dedicated and passionate and committed faculty and staff who work so hard as well to make tonight possible for us all. So thank you again for all of you, all the faculty and staff. Let's also do the same for your family and friends and all who supported you along the way. Thank you so much for supporting our students and making tonight such a success. Tonight, we're delighted to have an all star lineup of speakers to share a few words of wisdom and congratulations with you. But before we do, let me share a few thoughts. This past month, I've written articles and given talks on a number of information related topics, including digital preservation and archives advocacy and the future of libraries. Let me share a few highlights from each. The iSchool is working on an I'm less grant with the northern Cheyenne tribe called seeking immortality, where we're helping them record their language and select cultural artifacts. We visited it with them a few weeks ago, and one of their highest requests was simply to help record stories first and foremost that every unrecorded lifetime experience that is lost due to the passing of a due to the passing of an elder is a significant loss to us all. Our long term vision is to seek immortality for their native speakers and community leaders by taking full body scans of them and then using AI and chatbots to have virtual avatars that look and sound like them and can hold conversations with future generations hundreds of years from now. It is my belief that this will become a core service of libraries, the recording of stories and the use of AI to immortalize ourselves so our great great grandchildren can meet us someday in the future, long after we're gone. We must help others preserve today in the past for tomorrow. From an advocacy standpoint, as both individuals and advocates for our own work and institutions, it all comes down to articulating our and your own worth within the context of organizational and societal goals. As Alan Inouye, LA, LA, American Library Association Senior Director of Public Policy and Government Relations said, when he said it, or he said it best, that really advocacy is a professional responsibility for all of us and we cannot and should not leave it up to others. We effectively advocate in three primary ways, build long term relationships with peers and decision makers and their staff. So they're meaningful. There's a meaningful understanding of what is important to each other within our own personal and cultural context, and also so that disagreements on singular issues and not become relationship breakers. Discussions and disagreements are held at a human level and define who we are in the immense diversity our nation represents. Always be respectful and polite in building and maintaining these relationships. Two, have multiple points of data on why what you do and what your organization does is value added and has high return on investment. If you don't have the data to share with others, then you immediately lose credibility in the eyes of decision makers. And three, gather and share stories of impact with a particular emphasis on patron customer stories of satisfaction and success due to your service programs and resources. Also, one final note, the majority of funding is local. And so if you ever wonder if you can rely on a state or national advocacy committee that represents you, the answer is no. Local funding typically is over 90% of funding, and so all of us must advocate for our own worth and what is important to us and how that is aligned to the organizational, societal, short and long term best interest. Finally, the libraries of the future. First, they'll be data driven and community centered. In our disrupted world, libraries are being used more often than ever due to the fact that digital access is increasing much more rapidly than print circulation is declining. Access to data, especially visualized data is essential in helping us make informed decisions as real time as possible. Also, decision makers really like to see this type of data and visualize data in particular. Second, however, is that no one should be taking the value of libraries and information for granted. As lack of support for libraries is usually not due to real opposition, but rather that other services are in higher demand and are higher priority for future funding. Remember relationships, data and stories of impact. Third, libraries of the future are going to be even more high tech than they already are. As hard copy print materials continue to decline, the born digital data and job competencies that go with them will significantly increase the digital divide between the haves and have nots. And finally, libraries will continue to provide equal access to high quality vetted and peer reviewed resources, services and programming. In the era of increased censorship and book banning, libraries serve as the freely accessible foundation for access to open information for everyone. We just now have many more diverse ways to do this. As we celebrate all of you tonight, the field of information could not be more exciting and turbo charged. I hope you're excited about the endless world of possibilities your SJSU iSchool degree afford you. And my final advice to you for success in your career and life in general is to work extremely hard and be kind to others. You must give to get. Thank you so much. Next, I'd like to introduce our associate Dean Sandy Hirsch for our Dean's address. Sandy, thanks for joining us. Thank you so much. And on behalf of the College of Professional and Global Education, I bring greetings and congratulations from the Dean. As the former director of the School of Information and the current associate Dean for academics in the college, I am particularly thrilled to be here today to congratulate our graduates of the School of Information. In your course of study in the School of Information, you have all gained a deep understanding of how information can be applied to address some of the world's most challenging problems. And you have also gained the skills and knowledge that will enable you to make a difference in your communities. I congratulate the School of Information's outstanding master's degree students who are graduating with their MLIS, MARA, and Informatics degrees, and also to those who have completed their teacher librarian programs and certificate programs. And as you've already heard from Dr. Chow and Dr. Meen, we are very excited to be celebrating our very first class of undergraduates who are graduating from our college. This is a huge milestone achievement and we're super excited. So we are especially wish to congratulate those who have just completed that iSchool's new BS in Information Science and Data Analytics degree. While today marks the end of one segment of your career journey with the completion of your degree, it is also just the first step in what we know will be a rewarding, inspiring, and impactful future. I am excited to see what the future holds for you and I know that you will go on to achieve great things. Congratulations and all the best of luck to you in your next adventure. Thank you, Sandy. And also want to give a special shout out to Sandy for her and Dr. Meen's work and really creating all at the iSchool as today. So thank you for all your work, Sandy. Okay, now we are going to have a special video from the 2223 president of the American Library Association who could not be with us today. She's a very busy woman, but she is the who is the adult services assistant manager of the Palos Verdes Library District Rolling Hills Estates, California. And so she wanted to pre-recorded a special message to you. And so, Alfredo, are we ready? Hello, San Jose State University School of Information graduates. It is such an honor and a pleasure to congratulate you on completing your master's degrees. I know that this journey has not been an easy one. Whether you began your degree before or during the pandemic, you made a commitment to libraries and our communities in the bleakest of moments. And upon graduation, we'll be entering the library world in one of our most challenging times as we advocate for the freedom to read for all. Our shared core values of intellectual freedom, social justice, sustainability, democracy and more are what garner me when times get tough. And as you all enter the next phase of your career, I hope they garner you too, because we know that we are on the right side of history and that we will not allow a vocal minority to strip us of our freedom to read. Our communities love and trust us, and we are here for them. And I want to thank you for making this commitment to our communities and thank you for making this commitment to our profession. Our profession is strong because of individuals like you who understand the power of collective action and the impact we can make when we work together. When I graduated with my own master's in library and information science, I had no idea what my future would hold. I mean, I thought I did. But the opportunities that opened up for me were beyond my wildest imagination. From programs I was able to put on like elephant and piggy parties to recataloging indigenous mythologies from the folk and fairy tale sections to the religion section to giving back to the profession through associations and helping to develop our next generation of leaders. All of these opportunities and more. I hope you also remain open to. Because remaining open to harnessing your power and the wisdom you bring to your jobs to see what impacts you can make in the least likely of places will be the most rewarding. And please know that the American Library Association and I are here to help you harness that power and explore your careers in whatever direction they take you next and the direction after that and after that and after that. We are here for the entirety of your career and beyond. We are so proud of you all and can't wait to see what you do next. All my cutting. Congratulations. Lessa is such an amazing speaker. And unless if you're watching this, thank you so much for taking the time to give our graduates a warm congratulations. Okay, our next speaker is the Ken Haycock Award for exceptional promise that goes to one of our students, and that is Max Gonzalez Burtick. Max. Thank you so much. It's truly an honor to be celebrated for my accomplishments as both a graduate student in the high school program at SJSU and as a leading information professional. I want to start by thanking Dr. Anthony Chow, Dr. Mary Ann Harlan, Dr. Mary Bolan, Dr. Ken Haycock, the committee and the entire School of Information Faculty for this prestigious award. To me, the Ken Haycock Award means being a leader in my education in my career and in life to take initiative in creating library programs and services that are essential in developing an intercultural communication between people of all walks of life. And in promoting a rich understanding of diversity in the best measurable way. My passion for libraries started at an early age where I would go to the libraries after school, and I would just do my thing and work with my colleagues. My passion for libraries was extended when I attended UC Davis and I received my bachelor's degree in both English literature and communication. After college life took a turn, and I became a reserve deputy probation officer and a social worker for five long years. It wasn't until my fifth year that I started volunteering at the local public library that I knew I had to change careers and start from the bottom up. And so I was hired at the military libraries in the Marine Corps community services as a library technician, which was a big change, but a change and a risk that ended up being the most rewarding as I was promoted to library branch manager. I was doing all of this while being the block director for the special library association student chapter, applying for many scholarships and working on my master's in this wonderful high school program. I want to give a special thank you to Dr. D for listening and understanding my willingness to want to work and gain library experience and for offering me a start at the special library association. It was here where I was able to learn about the many different types of libraries and to showcase my blocks to students at SJSU. I would also like to thank my spouse for always always supporting me in every step of the way to my parents who have instilled in me the importance of education from the very beginning to my sister who let the way and who actually just graduated last month with her own master's degree as well. I was raised in a socio economically disadvantaged neighborhood to the point where my family and I had to bring our own lunch to places like Disneyland. So for me this graduation is a magnificent achievement and one that I am very proud of to see where I am today and be able to help my family has been gratifying. I'm sharing the story with you because I want you to know that it's okay to take big life changing risks and to focus on what you love to do. If you put your all into your goals, then the rest will follow. My next goal after graduating is to put my focus on utilizing $100,000 from the headquarters at Marine Corps to redesign my library, purchase new furniture and a brand new circulation desk so that our library can become the best place to visit for active duty who are serving our country. Now I would like to congratulate my fellow colleagues who are here today and to share some words of wisdom. When I first started working as a library manager, I was given a phrase from a boss's boss that I always look back on whenever I'm working. The phrase was to always lead by example. Leading by example means setting the standard for expectations and ensuring others that you are putting in the work and are overachieving. It means being able to delegate work, inform and teach others with kindness and be a team player. I would like each of you here today to take this message with you to lead by example to be brave to take risks to protect the importance of literacy and to advocate for intellectual freedom and the right to equitable and inclusive services. As a first generation Mexican American and a member of the LGBTQ, I cannot express how important it is to be a leader in this field, and to show the importance of standing up to censorship. I want to encourage you all to continue working on your dreams, whether that's to become a librarian, an archivist, a museum curator, an information referral specialist, or whatever it is that you would like to do. Within a short three years I went from being a volunteer to managing my own library. And that's a remarkable experience that I took upon myself with a lot of hard work, sacrifice and determination. It's also very fulfilling to know that my efforts are rewarded and appreciated. And I hope that my venture is an inspiration to you all. If I could give one last advice, it would be to do everything that you can to apply apply and apply to as many positions that are available. If you don't have work experience, then start volunteering now and add that to your resume. And when it comes to working show others that you are loyal, dependable and a hardworking leader, because a good reputation is what's going to propel you to new heights and to be successful. Thank you. Thank you so much Max we're so proud of you and thank you very much for those inspirational remarks. Our next speaker is a welcome home of sorts. Michelle Pereira is the director of library and recreation services for the city of son of Sunnyvale, and also an iSchool alum Michelle thank you so much for joining us. Thank you Dr tell thank you for having me good evening everybody good evening graduates come first of all before I say anything congratulations. I am so proud of the work that you've done and getting to this momentous occasion it's such an amazing accomplishment. And you know as I was thinking about what to say today and I'm truly honored to have been asked to participate today. So thinking about what to say I thought you know I could tell you all about myself that you know I've been working in libraries for 30 years that I taught for S.U. SLIS for seven years that I am from Sri Lanka that I'm an immigrant that I'm a traveler that I am unabashedly a crazy cat lady. But I thought I would rather spend my time talking about some of the lessons that I have learned in my years in the library profession and hopefully just in part a few things on you that you can walk away with that will hopefully help you in your career. I'm really kind of divided up into two things one, the work we do every day for our on our jobs, serving our community and whatever kind of community that is. And then the other piece of being a librarian and that is our profession and how we have an impact on that profession and how we serve that profession. I want to make sure that I try and get to all of these I've got like a little top 10 list that I'm going to share with you. And I'm not really sure if you can see it but I'm wearing my leave league of extraordinary librarian shirt which was the theme of my presidential conference so I'm really proud of it. And let me start with number one lesson that I've learned is start early and build your brand. There's a lot about branding in the commercial sector. We talk a little bit about it in the public sector, but I'm not talking about that I'm talking about your own individual personal brand and the importance to establish a strong brand. It's really important. For me, when I started thinking about this, I thought about what my brand actually is and I asked people around me, hey, what would you say are the three words that would describe me. And then I thought what are the words that I want to be that I want people to use to describe me where do I want to get to and what do I need to do to get there. And the words that reflect my brand are the words innovative strategic, someone with a vision for the future trustworthy that's really important to me. And then also someone who believes in my team. Those are things that I find really important I do everything to try and maintain that brand. It didn't happen overnight it took years to build and the importance of spending that time building that brand is you're really building brand equity so inevitably in our careers we're going to fail at something it's going to happen it's okay I'm here to tell you it's okay I have failed many things, but that brand equity is what saves you, because people look at you go that's not who Michelle is she's all these other things and they look past that failure. So really think about your brand image and think about perhaps what three to five words you want to reflect who you are, and start working on that and building who that's who you're going to be. The second thing I will say which is just as important as be strategic. There are so many things to do all day long we do not have time to get through everything that we need to do. So you have to be strategic in your decision making. Think about certain projects or services or pick things that are going to help you get to where you want to go. So for me. I wanted to try and have as much impact as I could both in my community through my job, and also in my profession and as I thought about that, like okay what can I do to achieve that impact. So as a, I was probably a librarian one or librarian to in the city that I worked for I volunteered to help out with the EOC the emergency operation center. And the reason I did that is because all of the training, all of the meetings that revolved around that were conducted by our city managers that put me in front of the right people. And it allowed them to see what I was capable of doing and it gave me a lot more latitude a lot more experience, and a lot more potential for upward mobility in that organization. I also thought about the impact I want to make on my profession which is equally important to me. And so, just like Lessa has made a huge impact on our profession through the American Library Association. I decided to work with the California Library Association and try and make an impact that way. And, you know, it might be small it might be large but I spent the last 15 years volunteering from, you know, working on a conference to doing a program to being on the board and then being the president. And all of these things really helped me establish my brand and who I am so those two go hand in hand. The third thing I will say is, and this was mentioned a few minutes ago lead by example, it may sound cliche at times but it's so true we have to be able to walk the talk. You know, you can be a leader in any position you don't have to just be a leader, you don't have just be at the top to be a leader, you can lead from anywhere. But the important thing is think about those qualities that are important to you as a leader. Who have you seen, there's several people who are on here right now, who are major leaders in the library profession and think about the work that they've done and what they stand for. As you look at those characteristics and those trades. That's what you want to try and if you want to embody those, you've got to walk that every single day and be that person. That's what other people are going to see and it's so important to do that. Leaders have vision. They are strategic leaders in their organizations, build a culture of trust I can't emphasize how important that is. They inspire creativity and other people. And that is such an amazing thing to do to be able to bring something out of someone else and empower them to be able to do things on their own. They really are able to get people to follow them and follow them in their vision that they have. And those are all big things, but leaders are also they illustrate that nothing is beneath them. They're willing to do whatever it takes and that sometimes means and I am definitely one of those people who at the end of a large event. In the library or my recreation department, I am going to be the first person to help pick up a chair fold a table or pull down an easy up and load the track because it's important to stay humble and it's important for your team to see who you are, and that you are willing to lead and do anything it takes to support the group. The next thing I'll mention is be innovative, be creative, reinvent something that's so exciting to do. There's the business guru Peter Drucker who once said the only way to predict the future is to create it. Let that settle in for a minute. That means taking a risk that means trying something perhaps you haven't tried, but it means creating something that perhaps never was and that is just one of the most amazing things to try and do. So I encourage you to take the time to innovate take the time to iterate to trend watch and think about how you can change the way you do things, or perhaps do something new that has never been done. A few years ago, my former boss was the president of CLA and he asked me to be his conference chair and he said, Hey, I'm really quick come up with something for conference it's never been done before. I was like, Oh, okay, let me let me come up with that really quick. And I thought about it for a while. What hasn't been done at conference I mean I'm sure there's lots of things that take money. So that was off the table. And I said to him, Hey, what if we instead of stopping like we do normally a conference at five o'clock, what if we went all night long. And he was like, Oh, hold on, that's a lot. And I said, Okay, what if we run till midnight or one o'clock in the morning. So anyway, out of these discussions came the night track at the California Library Association conference which is super popular. The first year we did it, I did a program at 10 o'clock on a Friday night on failure and I 200 people in that room, wanting to listen to those library directors talk about a failure that had. It was an opportunity to do something different something edgy. We knew there were lots of new librarians coming into the profession who wanted to spend time together wanted to socialize who wanted to be out later than five o'clock. Who wanted a bar. And so we provided all those things. And that night track is still going on today. In my job when I was the director of the Rancho Cucamonga library. Actually, this is when I was the assistant director. We had started introducing toys into the children's room which most libraries have done. And one day I was at a museum and I saw this geography exhibit that it really captured me. And I thought to myself, as I was coming home I thought, Wow, what if we were to create some kind of interactive exhibit for our children's room that featured all of these different kinds of toys or different kinds of play and tactile experiences. And we got a grant to do a proof of concept hired a museum designer, and we created these interactive exhibits that were scalable that were small enough for a library to use, and that were flexible and movable and all of that. And they were the most popular things at our library. And what was great was all these other libraries heard about it and we ended up selling like 50 or 60 of these museum exhibits really that worked in libraries to other libraries. And it was great to be able to create something that wasn't, and introduce it into the library world and really try a different type of service model. So the bottom line is, look around you all the time, whether you're at the grocery store whether you're online at the gas station whatever there are so many places that you can look and get inspiration. You just have to always think about how can I apply this to what I'm doing at work or what am I doing in my profession, and think of that way to translate it, and that will really give you a leg up on a lot of other people who don't think like that. The next thing I'll say is, pay it forward. Everyone here who's spoken today has had someone in their career or probably someone who have been remarkable and done something great for them. I know I've had great mentors in my, my career and I am so grateful to them. They've helped me on my journey and they've really helped me, you know, through their generous spirit become who I am today. So I would say, you know, be a mentor one day, get involved with an organization like LESA has like ALA or like I did with the California Library Association or PLA or Reformer or Apollo. There's so many become a member volunteer and give back to our profession and to the next generation of librarians as you go on in your career. Like I said, I volunteered for many years in for CLA and I've never regretted one minute of it. It's really been very fulfilling. And it's important for us to really make sure we're giving back to our profession. The next thing I'll say is, ask yourself a question when you're faced with issues. Is this your hill to die on. There's so many things that you're going to come up with in and I, I, when I was, you know, just starting out, I really felt like everything was a problem. It's like, I blew up everything. I made it bigger than it needed to be. And if it's just the usual routine stuff that's bugging you at work, you know what, that's why we get a paycheck. Let it go. We have so many other hills to die on LESA mentioned some of them that we really need to focus on as librarians and you guys are coming out of library school at such a great time. You know, we're in this post pandemic world and we are really reinventing the way libraries are getting used because people's the way people do things has changed the way we eat the way we pick up food. All of that has changed so and libraries have to and our traffic has so you're coming out at such a great time to do that. But some of the things that you're going to have to really take the mantle on is freedom to read. You know, I cannot believe we're still having this conversation about fan books in 2023. I mean, this is ridiculous. But this is something that we are dealing with sustainability for fun funding sustainability and libraries is something huge and that is something that we really need to think about. You know, you get an organization like a city or a county and you're funneling so much money into public safety and I'm not saying that's not important, but the more money put into libraries and community services and zero to five. And after school programs the less money down the road you're going to have to put into public safety that is proven. So that is something else that you're going to have to contend with as you're coming out of this. I mean, librarians have been talking about equity. Since God was a child, I mean we have this has been part of our language forever I've never known it not to be. And now the rest of the world seems to have jumped on board about equity and diversity. But it seems like whenever we take a step forward we're taking steps back when it comes to diversity and LGBT and we need to really make sure that we are on the right side of that and libraries. So all of these things. So my messages really think about is this your hill to die on and which ones are you going to choose. The next thing I'll say is have a nimble career plan. And I say nimble because you want to be able to move and Bob and leave as you need to when new opportunities come up. It's always important to have even if it's a one year plan that's okay or three year five year even a 10 year. It really doesn't matter just have an idea of what you want to do. The skills that you're going to need the training you're going to need to achieve that it is so crucial because things will happen and it might not happen right in front of you where you think it will might happen over there. And you have to be always thinking about gosh will that get me where I want to be. Decide on the kind of impact you want to have in your in your life in your job in your profession and think of the look for the opportunities that are going to give you that. For instance, do you want to supervise or manage what training your skills are going to make you more marketable to get to that role what can you volunteer to do in your job. That's going to give you what you need to then be competitive for that next job. If you want to be a director. I'm hoping some of you do. But it's not for everyone, but what I would encourage anyone who's interested in really moving up and becoming a director and trying to affect change is to not stop at being a director. Please if you hear nothing else we hear this. It is so it as a library director. I'm given a pot of money to spend every year. And if I want more money I've got, you know, I've got to do a lot of maneuvering to try and get it or I've got a fundraiser I've got to go to my friends. I wish I thought about this earlier in my career is think about what's beyond a library director if you can become a city manager or a county CAO or the director of a school or the dean of a school, or of a museum. So what we need are the decision makers that decide the where the pots of money go and who gets it. That's where we need more librarians to go we need you to move up into those decision making roles, even into those political roles, because that is what's going to make a difference and give libraries far more power than we already do so if you hear nothing else I hope you hear that. I think I will say and I'm sorry I'm moving quickly but want to get through my 10, please celebrate success, I cannot emphasize how important it is to celebrate success. You all need to celebrate this accomplishment that you have just achieved it is remarkable it is important, and you need to take a moment. I think about what you've got right now is true success and it's huge, but success is also trying. And that is something that we sometimes forget about the importance of celebrating someone who tried. What one thing we try and do and I try and do is whenever we do some large staff report for city council or get something that's almost across the finish line, we celebrate turning in the grant application. Never mind that we get it. It's important to try and celebrate those accomplishments because that's it was a heavy lift for people. So think about celebrating the try, as well as the success. It can be simple it can be a hey thanks so much great job it could be a handwritten note, I will tell you a handwritten don't goes a long way, or an email or a cupcake or a cookie or a party. One of my proudest moments of my career was 10 years ago, my library won the National Medal, and that, which is given out by the Institute of Museum and Library Services and we got to travel to Washington DC, and Mrs Obama presented my library with this national talk about like the eclipse of a career. But it's great as that was the most exciting thing was the week before we had a huge party to tell staff we had won. And we invited anyone we could think of that had some kind of influence other library people, people in the community to have a party and just celebrate the work of achieving that. So think about the importance of celebrating those wins. And then sometimes, I will say, take time to reflect on those special moments in your career. Sometimes we have, we've all had one of those days we may have had many of those days where we have self self doubt and, you know, quite frankly maybe we're throwing ourselves a little pity party I know I've done it. But it is in those moments that I take time to reflect on some of the special moments in my career. Obviously the National Medal was, you know, one of those. But I remember probably about 10 years ago I ran into a former student of mine, who wasn't sure what she wanted to do and she went through our class, which we taught reference this is how long ago, this was when it was required. And we taught a reference class and she came out of that class feeling she was going to be a public librarian and when she ran into me, probably five, six years after she graduated. She saw me and she literally threw her arms around me and said I just want to thank you you changed my life with that class. And that is a moment that when I have a bad day, I look back on and think about. I think about the time when we had this huge black history night celebration with about 500 people at the library. And this one mom came to me with her about five year old son and she said, I never had anything like this growing up as a child. And you are changing these children's lives by doing this and I knew the importance of that program to her and her family in that moment and how important it was to keep doing programs like that. And I will be really honest with you I graduated. Gosh, I finished in 1996 in December and I graduated at the ceremony in May of 1997 from San Jose State, and this is when we had the split campus and I was down south. I will tell you that it is full circle for me to be able to speak to you here today, and this moment right now will be one of those moments that stay with me that I will look back on so I thank you for including me today. And I thank you for listening. I thank you for selecting librarianship is calling in your in your life. I wish you all a career filled with success with fulfillment and with a little surprise. Congratulations graduates on your graduation on this momentous occasion. And I will leave you with number 10, my 10th tip, and that is something that I was told on my graduation day by someone very important to me and wrote it down on the little card which is still on my refrigerator, 27 years later. And he said, and I'm saying this to you, do great things. Thank you very much. Michelle, this is speechless. Incredible job. Thank you. I would love to follow up with you about getting your top 10 list. I would love to share that on our website. We're so proud of you. Thank you for coming back and sharing all that you've done and all that you've learned with our new graduates. I really appreciate it. Thank you for having me. I really appreciate it. Yeah, thank you, Michelle. We're honored. I also want to just a couple of notes about your top 10 list be a role model and walk the talk love it create the future you want to see and be part of love it, and also celebrate especially that you tried this fantastic. Thank you again, Michelle. Thank you so much. So our next presenter is john clay so moving on on to the other side of information. He is vice president of threat intelligence for trend micro and john we appreciate you taking a few minutes your time to share all that you've learned in your illustrious career. Thank you john. Yeah, thanks. Great to be here and very humbled that you allowed me to speak to the, for the folks so congratulations to all your graduates. I started in school. A long time ago, we didn't actually have courses in cybersecurity or it information technology so it's been, it's been so cool to see the university and education industry. Take this up because it's definitely needed so I want to talk a little bit about my background and give you some of the journey that I've done I'm 27 years in cybersecurity. It feels like I just started just the other day but it's been a long time. My background is up from Michigan went to Michigan State University and got a BS and electrical engineering. What's interesting I had a minor in computer engineering with that and I actually never used my double E degree so I never got into electrical engineering as a profession. I ended up taking some computer classes and interesting enough my first computer course was Fortran with punch cards. A lot of you probably have no idea what that means but basically you had these punch cards and you had to feed them into a machine and it would come out with it was your program and I can't tell you how many times my rubber band around my my punch cards broke and I lost my whole program because they were all out of order. But it was fun so I actually when I graduated I graduated in 1987 from Michigan State and my sister was working for a company out in Sunnyvale California, where you guys are. And she said hey we need a programmer for a program we have at this at work so she got me my first job, and I did computer program computer engineering and computer code. So basically I programmed in zero and ones. So it was, I did that for about three years and I found out again I wasn't really cut out to be a programmer. I started a desk for you know all day programming and I just kind of learned that I didn't want to do that so I shifted jobs at that point and you know Michelle talked about being nimble in your career and so I'm actually probably like Gumby, because I'll talk about it but I did I've done a lot of different jobs around. So I took that I took a job into with a company and I got into sales of computer equipment and my background was in Unix. So I started selling Unix servers and PCs and all that for that company and I kind of did that for a number of years and moved around for a couple of different jobs. And it was interesting enough I was out of out of work for a little while and I had just, I met a lady who eventually became my wife, but at the time I was out of work so I figured I, we're going to get married and I said I needed to get a real job again. I looked at an ad in a newspaper, most of you probably don't even look at newspapers anymore but back then this was in 1996. I answered an ad in a newspaper for a company that was looking for a sales person. I went did an interview and this guy a gentleman named Jim Leonard looked at my background looked at my resume and said hey you've got a good technical background. Why don't we need a sales engineer. And he's like would you do that I was like well I'll do anything I just need a job. I ended up hiring me as a sales engineer and I was the second sales engineer hired in North America for my company called Trend Micro. Trend Micro's been in cybersecurity since 1988. So I was very early on we're 35 years I've been with them now for 27 years. I know I'm probably atypical for most people these days who move from company to company to company I did that early in my career but then I started with Trend Micro and I've been with them for 27 years now. One of the reasons why I've stayed so long is one that's a great company I've loved the people there I love the owners. In fact, our founder, one of our founders is is our CEO, Eva Chen, which again is atypical and technology having a female CEO. Our company has a lot of diversity we are a global company so that's the other reason I love working with Trend Micro because I work with employees that are all over the world we work in 65 countries around the world so I get to interface with, you know, the Japanese with the Indians with the people in Canada with people in South America Brazil, China, you name it, I've been able to work with with people and know so it's been a fantastic opportunity for me. But inside I was a sales engineer and I started working and doing some I did some sales engineering management. I want to share a lesson for you because I had a little hiccup in my career at Trend Micro and what happened was I, I was a little upset with my manager, and I had a friend at work that I used to. He works with us too. And I vented to him via email and unfortunately that email was addressed to my boss, not him. And so my boss got this email and I obviously at the time I didn't write a very flattering look at what he was doing at the time. And so, you know, life lesson there if you're going to communicate to somebody make sure you are communicating to the person you were, you are supposed to be communicating with, but also, you know, suck it up, I shouldn't have done that. It was, it was bad manners on my part, but we all get frustrated at times. But just again take time sit down, take a deep breath before you do vent too much. So unfortunately at that time. I wanted to stay with Trend Micro but I knew I was not going to further my career under this person so I decided to move into marketing. So it's interesting I went from a technical role sales engineering role into the marketing side and my nature is kind of an introvert. But I've always enjoyed public speaking so I started to do a lot more public speaking at that point I, they would have me go and do events and I would speak on about cybersecurity and events and stuff. And so I became a product marketing manager and I actually launched a number of different products for us over the years. And I got into the education side so this is interesting because you all are remote learning, and this is back in probably 2000, I think, I started to build a remote learning program for Trend Micro to train our customers. On the products that we had so I built a virtual classroom I built we had virtual machines and we ended up you know and I had instructors that were teaching virtually. And so we kind of started the whole remote learning type of process there back in 2000 and, and that worked out very well and it was an interesting again there's change of a job it was a new new thing to do at the company and it was, it was a lot of fun and I enjoyed that. And then I started to get into more and more into the public speaking stuff and so actually today I'm basically a public speaker for Trend Micro I speak at conferences all over the world about cybersecurity. I regularly talk about the threat landscape out there, what the malicious actors are doing out in the world and so it's been a lot of fun to me and especially traveling around the world like I said I've been able. You can't see a lot of stuff on my walls here but I have, I have stuff that I've picked up over the years as in my travels to be able to to reminisce and memories and I would recommend that you do that and in your day to day routines that if you do go somewhere. Take some time take an extra day to go visit. Interesting story I was in Cairo for an event. We have an office there. And I was able to actually get some some time off and I, I did, I did the pyramids and I did a Nile dinner on the Nile. A whole bunch of things but what was interesting is actually I went to a Coptic church, where Jesus and Mary had spent time when they were in Egypt. And the next day a bomb went off at that Coptic church, and then about about a day later another bomb went off so I had two bombings happening while I was in there and my, my manager director at the time there. He took me aside said hey we got to get you out of the country, and I did not disagree with him so I ended up taking off but that's just one story of many that I could tell about travels around the world but again, it's been fabulous to be able to do that kind of thing. So being cyber security gives you a lot of opportunities so they asked me to talk a little bit about success and then I'll talk a little bit about the industry itself you're, I will just tell you right now you're for you that are going into cyber security or it. It's a fabulous industry. It's a lot of work, but it is a fabulous industry and it's going to continue to grow but a couple things that I learned in my, in my years and cyber security first and foremost I made a promise to me. I made a promise to myself early on that if somebody asked me a question I was going to get back to them. I may not have had the answer at the time but I got back to them quickly and I said, you know, I either I gave them the answer right away or I said hey I'm going to be able to find out that answer and I'll get back to you. It's been a great excitement for 27 years now with Trend Micro and and I've got a very good reputation inside the company that people realize that I will follow through on on any asks and I know. And so I would recommend that that's something you think about doing. It can be difficult at times because you can get a ton of requests coming your way. But people know that you, you received it and you've heard them and you are going to get back to them. They will, they will actually help you out. If you ever have and have a need of their services as well so that's one thing that I would recommend for sure so be nice and then you've been over and over be kind. Right, Dr chow talked about being kind and that's that's the second thing that I've done is I regularly will thank people I will praise people when they do good work. All of that is going to be is going to help you. I've been a little different in my career I've never really strive to be an executive. I've been kind of a worker be sort of speak over the years. Part of that is because when I started with the company out in San Jose. And then they allowed me to move to Colorado I'm currently in Colorado and I work out of my home I've been working out of my home for 23 years now. They allowed me to do that another reason why I've stayed with the company so they let me have let me work out of my home. And that's been a fabulous opportunity for me but it does come with some challenges so if you ever work from home I will give you some some tips there. First and foremost, in technology we a lot of us do desk work. So we sit at the computer for long periods of time. We will say after 27 years of doing that the body, it takes its toll and health wise, I would recommend regularly getting up from your desk, walking around doing stretches whatever it might be. I've done a lot of phone calls and video calls and I do those standing up I've got a standing at a debt I got to stand up desk. So I've done that as much as possible, but you have to move. Because the body does not like sitting and being sedentary for for long periods of time and and as you know what I found is that you can get in that groove and you can start getting on your computer and you can next thing you know it'll be three hours before you look up and you're like I haven't done anything and you have you've been sitting at a desk for three hours straight so you know whether you use a clock and alarm or whatever it might be just I would recommend moving. Another thing is willing to work you've heard this a few times I actually as a public speaker. Over the years, I've missed numerous anniversaries my wife and I just celebrated our 28th year anniversary. And I had to miss quite a few of those, because we had events came up and I had to go out of town. I was willing to do that work and and you know we had a good my wife's been fabulous over the years to understanding that my career is important and and need to, to, you know, have a given and take on that. So, you know, do that work as much as you can. You know you you heard earlier Michelle talking about it, you know, identify what you want to do do the priorities as much as possible. You know you can get wrapped up in a lot of minutia. So I would definitely recommend using you know there's lots of tools out there that can help you in your in your day to day operations sort of speak to help you do what's what is most important for work wise. Another thing I would definitely recommend everybody learned to public speak. You may not like it. I was like I said I was an introvert. When I tell you my first speaking engagement was awful. I was really stuttered I am hum, you know the whole bit, but you know I've been doing it for, you know, 20 plus years now speaking in conferences speaking in meetings, whatever it might be and it will definitely benefit you in your career if you can relay what you want to do to somebody outside or somebody you know that you're talking with so learn to do that public speaking if you want to get into public speaking I know there's a lot of businesses out there that look for people who can talk for them. And it's like I said I've had a great time doing it it's an enjoyable job. Another thing is take time for yourself. Michelle talked about this earlier but but I'll reiterate that. It can take up and work and it can take a lot of time up in your life. And, and it can be difficult, because you have to take some time off. You know, luckily we have, we have, we call it PTO or vacation time at work here. You know, it doesn't have to be a week all the time you can take a half a day even, or, you know, or take a day but do something to get you away from work I would also recommend social media. Take a time out of social media as we all know, you can be on your phone 24 seven basically following social media stuff but that's that's that can suck you into an area and it's and unfortunately in many cases it's. There's a lot of negativity in your life. So I would recommend taking time off of that as well and that that really helps. You know the other piece like I mentioned about moving you know if it were first thing in the morning or at lunch go take a walk I did that numerous times even when I worked in the office in San Jose. I would just go out and take a, you know, take a 30 minute stroll at lunch hour and I come back and eat a sandwich or something and get back to work so, but take time for yourself because it will help you mentally, it will help you physically. All of that will be will be beneficial to you. So let's talk a little bit about cybersecurity obviously you're graduating with it and it and cybersecurity. This industry is unbelievable. We may actually work on the vendor side so a lot of people may not realize that there's basically two, two sides to cybersecurity one is you can be a practitioner, where you're actually defending networks and systems against the malicious actors out there. It's also the vendor side where like with Trend Micro where we actually are creating products to help businesses and people to protect themselves. Our mission statement at Trend Micro is, you know, to ensure that the transfer of digital information around the world is safe. And we've, we've followed that model for for 35 years now and continue to do that but there are so many different jobs available to you as I you know just in my own career like I was saying, I've been in sales I've been in technical sales. I've been in marketing I've been in the education side. I'm now in the public speaking side so you know and even among that there's a ton of different opportunities that you can do with organizations on the practitioner side. There's numerous ways areas you can look at. You can be a threat hunter, where you're actually looking for the malicious threats that are coming into the organization, or, or in the business. You can, you could be a vulnerability expert we have a, a, what we organization called zero day initiative that's a bug bounty program. We pay out millions of dollars a year to people who find bugs in software. And so that's a career you could look at if you wanted to get in that we just had a bug bounty contest in in Vancouver, where two researchers found bugs in the Tesla infotainment system, and we paid them out $250,000 for those, and Tesla gave them the car. So, you know, kind of interesting now that's the that's the really cool aspect if you can get there but you know again that's work. There's a lot of work involved in that but, but you can take this industry and really kind of hone into what areas you like as a person. I do love, you know, marketing you can get into marketing if you love programming you can get into programming. There's so many opportunity out there for you I think last time I, I saw, there's over 3 million open jobs in cybersecurity around the world. It can take you to other countries if you want, especially because you know, again, there's, I think the US has under a million of those jobs so there's over 2 million jobs around the world, openings for cybersecurity so if you want to just to go do marketing outside the world. The other aspect is is in the industry is is it's very diverse. As I mentioned our CEO is female. We've got, you know, people from all over the world, every race, every, every gender you name it. It's it's the industry is very nice in that perspective so it don't limit yourself, you can take it to any level that you want. I think that artificial intelligence is is coming on big we've been actually using AI and machine learning since 2005 so over, you know, 15 years of, of working with that technology, but now with chat GPT coming out and some of those technologies large learning models. If you wanted to get into programming AI, that's going to be a massive opportunity out there, and probably some very very lucrative payment, paying jobs, if you wanted to get into that because again it's new. The best thing I've loved about this industry is it's constantly changing, I'm learning something new every single day that that that occurs whether it's through the technology that's the new technologies that are coming into play, or the malicious actors or some new tactic that that tries to circumvent the security products that we we we utilize. And so it's it's been enjoyable for me because it's kept me young by having to constantly learn education and that's my other point to you is if you do want to get that education you know that learning. You want to be constantly learning new things, and the beauty of it is with the internet today, you can learn anything you want. You know I can't tell you how many times on I go to YouTube now if I have to do something on my car I've got a 2000 Jeep Wrangler that breaks down all the time. I go on YouTube and somebody's already uploaded a thing on exactly how to fix it and you know so you can learn that there's learn new skills constantly and that will help you in life. And it also help you learn what you like to do what you know what maybe what you don't like to do so again your career path is going to be very diverse and can change and be as Michelle said be very nimble in that. Another aspect of our industry is that it will be here for a long time malicious actors cyber criminals are not going away. Last year we blocked 146 billion threats for our customers. That's a it was a 55% increase from the previous year. We're ramping up their attacks on businesses and people so you will have a industry continually for the next. I don't even know how long it's probably forever, you know, physical crime has not been solved. We still have physical crime out there. And so cyber crime is probably going to be unsolved for a long long time as well because these malicious actors are going to continue to do what they want to do out there and we have to protect it. The nice thing about the cyber security industry also is we are on a mission we're a mission to keep people safe. And that's a nice goal to have. It keeps you excited it keeps you young, it keeps you wanting to come back to work day in and day out because you know you are doing good in the world, you're doing something that can help people out there in the world. And, and so it's, I applaud you that you, you are getting into the industry and you've taken the time to go through the courses and stuff. I also recommend as much as possible, learning and getting in the practitioner side so doing CTFs, which are capture the flags. Doing those on a regular basis to learn to learn the industry learn how to do things that will definitely help you out there as well. So, I hope this helps you all understand kind of my journey, my journey hopefully is helped you understand what you can do in your life. It's, it's, it's been a wonderful life for me. I've raised three kids since I started at trend micro. I actually just went, we just put my son just graduated with a master's degree at University of Kansas, University of Missouri Kansas City last weekend. So we're doing the, we were doing that as well and I've got two others that are in university as well so you're doing a you're getting into a great industry you're doing a good job by graduating. I wish you all the best of that life has to offer. Stay, stay happy, stay fun. Work is can be fun. If you make it fun. It can be exciting if you make it exciting. It's all up to you. But I know you all will achieve your dreams and your goals that you want in life so thanks everybody. I appreciate you taking the time out tonight. Congratulations to everybody and again thank you for having me. It's been a very humbling experience for me and I wish you all the best of luck. Thank you so much john. And I want to thank john in particular for I've asked him twice to help me in some way and he said yes both times and I think john lives what he has talked about as far as being generous with this time. And what ends up happening is that of course, if he asked or needs anything from me in the future. The answer is going to be yes right now and then same thing from Sandy Lessa max. Of course Michelle, being generous with your time helping others really is creates a wonderful a network of giving. I want to thank all of our speakers for sharing their wisdom with us let's give them a loud round of applause. Appreciate everybody's use of emoticons to provide support for our speakers. Thank you all for being such role models and all the good that you do for so many people for being people we want to follow. Again but rather a significant milestone that serves as a beginning to a whole new world of opportunities and expectations for you and your family. Go forth and do great things. Don't fixate on mistakes but rather learn from them and become stronger because of them. Don't give up when your goal is to help more people. It's worth the effort, the frustration, the bumps and bruises be true to your values and your personal professional dreams. Go forth and do not let anything stop you from achieving what you wish to accomplish. Push yourself to always learn new things and expand your own boundaries of what is possible we oftentimes call that running from safety. Also make sure to take care of yourself along the way in your loved ones. Yesterday I'm proud to say that I was elected vice chair of the national little free library organization. Good friend fellow library of a little private little free library advocate in San Diego County Public Library director Miguel Acosta, best identified why his library system is installing little free library boxes across his county 44 to be exact. He calls it equity of access to library resources for all. So again congratulations the class of 22 and 2023. We now as tradition have a student video so you'll, we get to see and celebrate all of you so please enjoy that. And again, do not leave. We recommend staying and then also joining us in our party room are after graduation party room where we are unveiling the use of a high end virtual reality environment. So I encourage you to check that out and as Bethany said, you don't need any equipment whatsoever. It's just a hyper leak that we're going to share with you in just a second and I would encourage you to check it out and spend a little time with your faculty and staff and peers so.