Dear Murrow College graduate:

“Anyone who believes the future will be easier than the past is mad.” The words are not mine; they are those of our college’s namesake, Edward R. Murrow, in his WSU commencement address in 1962. It is a daunting and exhilarating notion.

The world has changed dramatically since Murrow’s day. Television news, the medium he pioneered, is no longer the dominant information source it was a lifetime ago – well, your lifetime, anyway. But the values he embodied – truth, fairness, moral courage – have never been more important.

Whether your career lies in journalism, advertising, public relations or brain surgery, I hope you are able to use those values as a compass to steer you on your path.

My own path has been profoundly shaped by Murrow’s legacy. I had the privilege to study television news under Ed Bliss, who was Murrow’s chief writer. As a young reporter covering Capitol Hill, I had the great pleasure of getting to know Larry Lesueur, one of the original “Murrow Boys” of World War II fame. And as a CBS News correspondent, I remember the chill that went down my spine when I first signed off, “Larry Pintak, CBS News, London,” knowing it was Murrow himself who first uttered the words “CBS News, London.”

And the greatest privilege has been that of serving as your dean – the founding dean of Murrow College. As many of you know, I am stepping down from the deanship. After seven years, it’s time to get back to practicing what we have been preaching to you. I’ll spend the next year working on a book about Islam and American politics and writing a column for Foreign Policy. I’m typing this note from a plane en route to Pakistan, where I will be on a reporting trip for the next couple of weeks.

Unfortunately, that means I won’t be at commencement Saturday. But I will be thinking of you, confident that you are also off on an exciting new adventure. Perhaps I will cross paths with a few of you in some far-flung corner of the world. Until then, to paraphrase Murrow, goodbye and good luck.

Lawrence Pintak

Founding Dean

The Edward R. Murrow College of Communication