Gil Medina Speaks at Bergen Community College Commencement

Cushman & Wakefield Executive Urges Graduates to Do Well and Do Good

“Be Successful. Do well. And most importantly, do good.” Gualberto “Gil” Medina, executive managing director of commercial real estate services firm Cushman & Wakefield, Inc. and chairman of the Bergen Community College at the Meadowlands Advisory Board, presented this directive to 2,113 graduates of Bergen Community College as commencement keynote speaker on May 20.

Medina addressed the largest-ever graduating class for the college at IZOD Center in East Rutherford. Paramus-based Bergen Community College – the largest in New Jersey –is a public two-year coeducational college offering associate degree, certificate and continuing education programs in a variety of fields.

“You are graduating in a time of great expectations and a time of great uncertainty,” Medina told the graduates. “You’ve heard it said before that great times make for great people. There is within each of you that spark; a heroism that affirms that you are here for purposes greater than yourselves.

“Each of you has the opportunity to secure rewarding employment and earn a good income,” he continued. “Maybe some of you in the audience today will create a new technology or a new business model that will help transform all of our lives. But I believe that the greatest challenge facing each of us is not our technology; nor evolving business models; but our vision for shared prosperity in the world.”

Medina noted that Mother Teresa described her life’s work with the following words: “It is not how much we do, but how much love we put in the doing. It is not how much we give, but how much love we put in the giving.”

Medina closed his remarks by posing a challenge to the graduates. “Do not just strive to be outstanding professionals in your chosen fields,” he said. “But strive for true greatness by becoming great human beings, by giving of yourselves and by putting love in the giving.”

Bergen Community College students connect to communities throughout Bergen County by taking part in Service Learning initiatives, applying what they have learned in the classroom to community organizations. This year, more than 500 Bergen students and 60 faculty members devoted more than 9,000 hours to helping social service organizations, government agencies, hospitals, schools and other organizations through service learning projects.

Nearly 17,000 students are enrolled in Bergen Community College programs taught at locations in Paramus, the Philip J. Ciarco Jr. Learning Center in Hackensack and Bergen Community College at the Meadowlands in Lyndhurst. The college experienced an increase of 37 percent in the 2010 graduating class from the previous year. The Class of 2010 includes graduates from August 2009, December 2009 and May 2010. Eighty seven percent of Bergen Community College students plan to pursue their formal educations at four-year colleges and universities.

About Gil Medina:
Medina joined Cushman & Wakefield in 2002 and assumed his current position there in 2005. He maintains responsibility for operations at the firm’s three New Jersey offices. An attorney and CPA, Gil is well-known in the state for his role as state commerce secretary under the Whitman Administration, in which he planned and implemented business climate and organizational reforms that dramatically improved New Jersey’s economy. Gil’s maintains deep, wide-ranging involvement in governmental, business and community organizations.