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Ani AdhikariLecturer, Statistics
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Acceptance speech
Thank you, and thanks especially to my students who are here.
You know, I'm looking at the three of us and I'm struck by the fact that two of us grew up in the city of Calcutta. I know that the rest of you think of it as some kind of pit of blackness, but Ananya and I know that the truth is different. So I'd like to take a moment to remember the city and country in which we were raised, which, in spite of all poverty and hardship, have always valued teaching and learning above everything else.
What's even more striking is that all three of us got our Ph.D.s here! So today is special, I think even more so than this day in other years perhaps, because it's not just a celebration of Berkeley in 2006—It's a celebration of Berkeley over the years. We're only good teachers because of the people who taught us. While I must confess to a few years at that unmentionable institution down in the Peninsula, once you've been at Berkeley your heart and mind are always in Berkeley. And the reason that they stay in Berkeley is what David said in the video–it is a phenomenon, a public institution that stands with the best in the world. We who are here are the ones who want to guard its heritage and to help it to flourish.
So today I'd like to acknowledge the people who have got me to this podium. My friends, who are here; the staff who keep the machine going; and my teachers, who are of course here because I was a student here. They are now my colleagues but they will always be my teachers. In particular, David Blackwell and Deborah Nolan– spectacular, both of them.
And above all, David Freedman. There are not many people in the world who can justifiably claim that they have changed the way a subject is taught. David can. He has influenced the teaching and practice of statistics far beyond this campus. He has taught me the importance of mastery of the mathematics, clarity and directness of exposition, respect for the underlying science, and above all, an uncompromising intellectual honesty. It has been a pleasure, and it continues to be a privilege, to learn from David.
And it is an equal privilege to pass that knowledge on to others. I think I speak for all three of us when I say that there's no such thing as a celebration of teaching—in the end, it's a celebration of the most important people on campus, and those are of course the students. The graduate students, without whom all reasearch and teaching comes to a grinding halt; and all of them, graduates and undergraduates—thank you for bringing the spark that you bring to the campus and into my life. Thank you for giving me the opportunity to watch you progress. I watch with nothing but delight and admiration, knowing that anything that we do here is only going to improved in great measure by you.
So because now I am officially a sage (and I have an award to prove it) I will give you a piece of advice. Do what you love most. Do it with a passion—give it everything you've got. And then, if you're lucky like me, you'll be able to spend your life doing what you love most, in the place that you love most.
Thank you very much. Thanks, Oliver.