Touring High Point University

This week I had the opportunity to attend an event at High Point University. My main goal was to hear Dr. Nido Qubein who is the President of the University. We also had a tour of the campus before lunch. Since then I have begun realizing lessons that I learned from the event.

If you are putting your name on something, budget for the maintenance of it. If people want to put your name on something, find out how it will be maintained. During the presentation we had seen pictures of old buildings that have now been replaced. They also have new names. During the tour, one cannot help but notice that they are maintained. I could not help but think that the name on the previous building meant old, dilapidated, unclean, and/or eyesore. Some way to be remembered! I am sure that is not what someone had in mind when they first gave the money for the building.

Remove bad distractions. The tour showed a clean campus. One does not have to dodge trash when walking on the sidewalks. Security guards were at each entrance. They were more like greeters but with uniforms and the nice fence and gates gave a feeling of security when driving onto the campus.

Be polite and assist others. Students hold open doors for visitors. They say “excuse me”. I walked back from lunch to the student center instead of using the shuttle. One student stopped his car for me to cross. How often do you see that?

Keep your focus. I was there to listen and learn. I cleared the day to just be for this event. I am still listing what I learned. I am glad of the lesson that I learned some years ago. Unless the item is life or death, it can wait or I am a slave to it. It is not a nice thought but it is real.

How many of us are spending time trying to handle something that we do not need to be handling? This campus is working to remove those distractions for the students, parents and faculty. Maybe that is the main lesson we all need to work on as the new year approaches.