Don't settle for mediocrity

In a fast-changing workplace marked by corporate downsizing, mergers and economic restructuring, Howard University graduates were urged yesterday to resist the "tyranny of mediocrity" by following three principles: prepare, perform and persevere.

Dennis F. Hightower, president of Walt Disney Television and Telecommunications, a Howard graduate and member of Howard's board of trustees, told about 2,000 graduating students that individual excellence is more important than ever in an increasingly competitive global society.

"You cannot assume, even in 1996, that you can take the path of being average," he told the crowd of about 18,000 in front of Founders Library under a brilliant mid-morning sun. In addition, Hightower, the highest-ranking black executive at Disney, told the predominantly African American graduates, "You are entering the workplace in a society in our own country that continues, all too often, to see color before capability."