Media Hub

On Friday, April 29, top scholars in the junior and senior classes were inducted into the school’s chapter of the Cum Laude Society, a national honor society recognizing academic achievement. After Cum Laude Chapter President Ceil Millar presented inductees with certificates and Headmaster Charlie Britton gave them gold ribbons, former Headmaster Bill Mules, delivered an engaging address. His remarks follow:

I am honored to be here, in familiar territory and among good friends and colleagues, some of whom can be carbon dated and traced back to the days when we worked together. That was in the latter part of the 20th Century. The “good old days” of wooden lacrosse sticks, tape decks, and The Ten Mile House.

I am honored to join a list of speakers at this prestigious ceremony that includes: statesmen, authors, editors, college presidents, even a Supreme Court Justice. I am also honored to be speaking, for me, this is the first time, in the Ceres M. Horn Theatre.

Allow me to digress and to talk personally about the remarkable young woman after whom this magnificent hall is named.

Ceres was a young and precocious 16 years old when she graduated from McDonogh. Were she alive today, she would be returning to campus this weekend to celebrate her 25th Reunion. Ceres died returning to her second term at Princeton in the crash of an Amtrak train in Chase, Maryland. Her death was a great loss to all. She was a young woman, truly of exceptional promise.

She had expressed a goal of becoming an astronaut and all who knew her considered that a reasonable career choice. She might have been on the crew of The Endeavour at today’s launch.

I will always remember one small, seemingly insignificant, moment which was an emblem for me of her congenitally strong character.

I arrived at my office one morning and found the plant manager waiting. A custodian had discovered graffiti and a swastika painted on a locker in the basement of Allan Building. Given the gravity of this obscenity, we decided to convene an immediate assembly. The locker room was closed and the locker door removed. The Upper School assembled in the dining hall… there was a muted buzz as all sensed that a serious matter was afoot. My message was brief, pointed, and obvious. “Not here! Never!”

There is always a lull after such gatherings. As the students and teachers left the hall to return to class, silence reigned. I understood that temporarily I would be left in isolation, shunned. What is called “being in Coventry” in English schools. No one came near me; to do so might give the appearance that you were confessing or reporting knowledge of the culprit. It was best to avoid the proximity of the Headmaster, less you appear somehow involved.

But not Ceres… she walked directly up to me, her hand extended. “Well done, Dr. Mules. We needed to hear that.” She turned and headed back to class, a woman of courage and conviction, that day, my Joan of Arc.

It is that sort of character that is recorded in the Cum Laude Motto: Arete, dike, time. With remarkable talent there comes the responsibility to use that potential for the betterment of others. Or in the words of Spike Lee or former Hopkins President Steven Mueller: “When in doubt, do the right thing!”

Ceres always did and she was never doubtful.

My purpose today is to bring recognition and applause to those students, currently in course, who have achieved highest honors and have been recognized by the faculty for their intellectual accomplishments.

To this score of talented students, soon to be festooned with a yellow ribbon we give you our genuine applause. Hard work, good fortune, a decent gene pool, dedicated and understanding teachers: an array of forces have escorted you to this stage today. Enjoy the moment, but don’t fall back on these short-lived laurels. There are miles to go before you sleep, miles to go before you sleep.

I would like to speak today not only to you the yellow ribbon troop, but also to the academic unwashed that sit toward the back of this house. I hope my message applies to all assembled here because I want to speak today about the “F-word” No. Not THAT F-word. Goodness. I’m talking about the dreaded F-word. The REAL F-word: FAILURE. As in “Mr. Harley gave me an F!”

Dreaded though it may be, it is my thesis that failure, or at least the threat of failure, is a critical ingredient in the creation of durable success. The perfect among you are entitled to reject my hypothesis and take a nap for the next 10 minutes, but the rest of you should pay attention. This might be helpful.

You don’t have to fail in order to succeed, but, like Churchill’s description of the effect of a bullet whizzing past your head, it does help to concentrate your attention.

I propose that there are two varieties of Failure: productive vs. counter-productive. Largely those varieties are separated by the reaction of the victim, who, by the way, may also be the culprit. From Shakespeare to Kipling, literature has addressed man’s and woman’s confrontation with the reality of frailty and vulnerability.

“The fault, Dear Brutus, is not in our stars, But in ourselves, that we are underlings.”

In defeat there lies the germ of eventual victory. And controlling the chemistry, the emotions, of failure is the critical and most difficult challenge.

As I reflected upon my notes for this topic today, I drew a mental list of students who had gained my respect because of their resistance to the corrosive effects of failure. Every teacher here today could nominate students for a failure Phi Beta Kappa Key. Students both talented and not so, who have seen their errors and moved on to greater things.

Consider Pannill Martin, a name that may sound familiar. There are scholarships named in Mr. Martin’s memory and he is buried in the Tagart Chapel. I knew Mr. Martin, having visited him at his home in Florida and listened to his tales about his early life as an orphan who was a classical self-made, autodidactic, entrepreneur. I was a trustee of his estate when he died, about 30 years ago, leaving $4 million to the School’s Scholarship endowment.

The unusual element in this story is that Pannill Martin was expelled: today’s vernacular “kicked out,” what was in 1898 described as “shipped.” His goods were packed in a trunk and sent (SHIPPED) to his home, an orphanage in Baltimore. Mr. Martin told me that he learned every lesson he needed to be a success when he had to leave McDonogh. He had converted the chemistry of his embarrassment into an impetus to move forward. That’s not a plan that I am proposing for any of you, but it worked for him!

There is, by the way, a failure website which features analyses of failure and, my favorite item,“This Day in Failure.” (Today, by the way of the Baltimore Orioles record-setting, season opening string of 21 consecutive losses!) Thomas Watson, revered head of IBM during the middle years of the 20th Century, is notably quoted by recognizing that “If you want to succeed double your failure rate.”

Innovation, like personal growth, depends upon taking suitable risks, looking failure in the eye, and being willing to be wrong. And, if that is the result, incorporating that failure into the next plan of attack.

At least 30 years ago I attended a lecture by a charming scientist, then a professor at CalTech, Paul MacCready. After hearing his presentation, I decided I wanted to meet him, so I waited in line to shake his hand. I’m glad that I did because he had lit a small fire of thinking that has remained alight for several decades. By the way, if you Google “Paul MacCready”, as I did recently, you can easily connect to a TED lecture archive that preserves, in part, the magic that he exerted upon me when I was a young teacher.

MacCready is best known for his design of the Gossamer Condor, a human-powered airplane that completed a one-mile, figure-eight course and thereby captured the generous Kremer Prize that had remained unclaimed for nearly 20 years. Actually, the challenge dates back to the origins of man when the mythical Icarus failed to accomplish the dream of human flight. The Kremer Prize wisely required that the human involved survive the ordeal, a criteria that escaped Icarus. The many unsuccessful efforts to win the prize had, understandably, concentrated upon providing safety.

Safety bespoke protection which, in turn, led to weight, and that, for flying, was the crux of the problem. Safety increased the chances of failure by adding excess weight. MacCready’s genius was to be found in changing that equation. If he could eliminate safety, then failure became an acceptable risk and he could concentrate upon other limiting factors, especially weight, the primary obstacle to success.

MacCready decided that his plan would fly so slow and low that any crash would be no worse than a minor fall from a bicycle. He brought a superb athlete, the bicyclist Bryan Allen, onto his team. Then Professor MacCready turned the tables on failure. He carefully recorded the details of each of his many unsuccessful attempts, specifically, what broke and, equally important, what didn’t break. The faulty part was slightly strengthened. Sturdy parts were weakened. Total weight was reduced. His aim was to come as close to failure as possible. Risk was his partner.

Eventually, standing beside an exhausted, smiling, and bruised Bryan Allen, he claimed the prize. He had spit in the eye of failure and succeeded. He stood at the margin where progress is made, the cambium of human potential.

With closing in the offing, let me return from the dreams of flight to the earthly reality of your education through your years at this fine school.

For many reasons you are very fortunate, surely you know that. Ranking high on the list of your good fortune is your acquaintance with the superb men and women of the McDonogh faculty. I have worked alongside many of your teachers and I know personally of their expertise and their unfailing dedication to your welfare. Whether or not you get a yellow ribbon today, you are a cherished commodity in the hearts of your teachers.

To epitomize those kudos, I offer a brief vignette of one McDonogh teacher. Arthur Davis, Otts to his fellow teachers, joined the McDonogh math department about 1970. He was a graduate of Gilman and a long-time resident of Baltimore. We were friends. At that time I was a guidance counselor and college admissions advisor for the Upper School. One of my annual tasks was the preparation of the schedule and the creation of class lists for the next fall.

With Otts teaching Algebra 1 for the ninth grade, I was acutely aware of his popularity. The word was out. “Get in Mr. Davis’s class if you want to pass safely through the Dardenelles of Algebra 1.” It was evident that Otts was able to insert the square Algebra peg into the round math hole in certain heads. One day I asked Otts why he thought he was such a skilled Algebra teacher and he quickly responded, “Because I failed it at Gilman.” And I understood.

Otts had the marvelous skill of being able to see faulty thinking and to redirect it toward the lighted path. He knew the pitfalls of failure and thus could guide the unwary. Like Professor MacCready he turned failure on its heel, as do all those teachers whose confidence in you has given them the patience of saints.

I encourage you to reward that confidence by having the courage to grab risk by the tail and to take a bit of a ride toward your exciting futures. To seek the most challenging of the pathways that lie ahead of you, the “path less traveled.” To follow a dream, even to aspire to be an astronaut. To become immersed in a culture that is entirely foreign. To forego comfort and familiarity, to stand alone, avoiding the clubby comfort of current tastes. To make your own mark.

Arete, dike, time. To use your exceptional talents and good fortune to move our world toward being a better place.

I thank you for the honor of having this moment to offer you my very best wishes.

Godspeed.