Former Google CEO Eric Schmidt tells BU grads to solve world’s problems through technology, innovation

Standing before Boston University’s Class of 2012, former Google CEO Eric Schmidt told graduates although the economy is not good, they have a competitive edge.

“You have an innate mastery of technology, an ability to find, build, foster connections that no generation before you has ever possessed,” Schmidt said at BU’s 139th commencement at Nickerson Field Sunday afternoon. “It’s a very, very powerful skill that you’ve taught yourself.”

Schmidt told the graduates that their generation “is the first fully connected generation the world has ever known,” and that, as a result, the graduates have a responsibility to use that capability to solve many of the world’s problems.

“To connect the world is to free the world, I say, and if we get this right then we can fix all the world’s most pressing problems to beam bright rays of hope to millions who can see it as only a flicker,” Schmidt said. “You have that power right in your pockets or your pocketbooks right now.”

Schmidt said these new connections that students may make are not possible without a heart, which computers do not have.

“You have heart and the future will not beat without you,” he said.

College of Arts and Sciences senior Leila Belmahi, the student speaker, told her classmates not to expect all of life’s answers to appear before them.

“When we were freshmen we thought that the seniors had all the answers. So here it is, I’m here to tell you the senior secret, and it is,” she said, looking all around, “that there is no secret.”

The BU culture has always reminded each student to “be you,” Belmahi said, and BU is a special place that praises students’ diversity.

Schmidt urged the crowd to turn off their devices for just one hour a day. While he said he believes in the ability of the graduates’ generation to rule technology, they cannot let technology rule them.

“Learn where the off button is,” he said. “Take your eyes off that screen and look into the eyes of the person that you love, all right?”

Before Schmidt’s speech, Sargent College of Health and Rehabilitation Sciences senior Fernando Limbo III presented the class gift. In the Spring 2012 semester, seniors raised $60,080.

“This year’s class gift campaign was very special,” Limbo said. “With 2,408 participants, it was the most successful class gift campaign in BU’s history.”

At the beginning, BU President Robert Brown called for a moment of silence to remember the four BU students killed this year.

He also bestowed honorary degrees to former Lockheed Martin CEO Norman Augustine, U.S. Navy Lieutenant Commander Thomas Kelley, Chief Judge of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the First Circuit Sandra Lynch and “Star Trek” actor Leonard Nimoy.

Nimoy received Vulcan peace signs from graduates in the crowd.

“The iconic status of Spock is above all a measure of your talent as an actor and your character as a person,” Brown said of Nimoy. “This is a role that you have not only played over the course of several decades but one that you have guarded and nurtured.”

BU School of Medicine professor Robert Lowe and Writing Program Curriculum Coordinator Marisa Milanese also received the Metcalf Award for Excellence in Teaching, a $5,000 award for finalists competing for the Metcalf Cup and Prize for Excellence in Teaching.

Physics professor Andrew Duffy received the cup and prize, a $10,000 award.

Brown told the graduates that as they leave Nickerson Field, they join a long line of BU graduates that include some 300,000 living alumni.

“Your accomplishments will be part of the fabric of our legacy,” Brown said. “Your Boston University education has prepared you well.”

Brown urged the graduates to embark into the world and make a better place for everyone.

Schmidt urged graduates to engage in the world around them and feel, taste and smell what is right in front of them.

“Life is not lived in the glow of a monitor, life is not in a series of status updates, life is not about your friend count,” he said, “it’s the friends who actually you can count on.”