Jacob Neusner's Speech

Life Just Got Real

John Fitzgerald Kennedy Junior once said, “People often tell me I could be a great man. I’d rather be a good man” states azquotes.com (31121). History documented on Wikipedia.org states, Kennedy, the son of former United States President John Fitzgerald Kennedy, graduated from Brown University in 1983, then he went on to become a lawyer and a publisher. Correspondingly, Jacob Neusner’s “The Speech the Graduates Didn’t Hear” speaks for the attitude of the professors at Brown University in 1983 toward its graduates, because they strive for them to become great people that achieve brilliant innovations.

What is notable about Neusner’s speech is that he acknowledges the disgrace they all feel for the underachievers who are graduating, and he believes they are ill-prepared for the real world or the effects their egocentric attitude will have on their future. Basically, the graduating class had arrogantly believed they knew more than the professors, by saying they deserve an outstanding grade for assignments that did not qualify. Also, Neusner says it is no longer acceptable for people to manage around the graduate’s needs, and forgive them when they don’t deliver on an appointed schedule. Including, the professors feel

Maybe, the graduates might justify they were not prepared for the high level of academic learning, but nobody becomes a lawyer, doctor, or historian because it is easy. Possibly, many of the graduates grew up in an institutionalized environment since grade school going to private schools followed by college. Similarly, Wikipedia.org states about John Kennedy Junior who went to different private schools until he went to college, much the same as many of his fellow graduates (web). Thus, like John Kennedy Junior they too have lived in a protected environment a majority of their