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Giving the student address was CSM Winter 2014 graduate Austin Rick of Waldorf, who told his fellow graduates, “It is a great honor to stand here tonight, and to celebrate our important achievement. As graduates, we have faced uncertainty and we have overcome challenges.

For as long as I can remember, music was my life. I was disinterested in college, and wanted nothing to do with the boring, everyday workforce. I saw for myself a future far greater. During high school, I took extended excused absences so I could travel to Nashville to work on my first studio album. For five years following high school, I traveled and performed. I recorded music and I signed autographs—lots of them. I thought myself invincible. I called my own shots, and I answered to no one but myself.

This world—these artificial realities in which I resided—would eventually come crashing down. Then my life changed forever.

In a chance conversation with my cousin, Ashley, I was asked if I had ever considered returning to school. I laughed. I didn’t fit my own image of an undergraduate student. I was nearly 26 years old and undergraduate students were just out of high school. They were taking advantage of academic opportunities I’d already squandered. I became enthralled at the idea of starting anew—of reclaiming the time I had frivolously tossed away.


Among my favorite quotes is, “The biggest room in the world is the room for improvement. Good, better, best, never let it rest until your good is better and your better is best. Always make room in your life for improvement.”

We can make ourselves into whatever we wish. The formula is simple: recognize possibility, envision success, pursue relentlessly—and swing wide open the door to the biggest room in the world.