Annual giving makes a difference: An Illinois student Shares his story

"I thank you for providing the resources to make this possible: the generous donations to build state-of-the-art facilities, to recruit world-class faculty, and to provide the financial aid necessary to fill this University’s halls with the best and brightest. Even more so, I thank you for simply having confidence in this generation." Jake Hendee

On April 29, 2009 Jake hendee spoke to members of the chancellor's circle and the presidents council. we wanted To Give Illinois Alumni and friends the opportunity to read his story.

From Jake Hendee . . .

Justin Irvine was four years older than me. He attended the same rural northeast Kansas high school that I attended. He passed away from leukemia at age 18.

Justin was a great student and well-liked by his peers. He was known for his kindness and especially, an unabashed love for his family, just a good kid. During his funeral, as I stood on my tip-toes at the back of the Pleasant Ridge High School gym, four words that had become synonymous with Justin ended a poignant slide show, “Go to your destiny.”

When I was a high school senior, I received the Justin Irvine Memorial Scholarship, which supplemented a generous financial aid package from the University of Illinois. My parents, both teachers, would have spent every cent of their retirement to get my brother and me through college. But thanks to people like you and people like Justin’s father, I was able to attend the University of Illinois without driving my parents into bankruptcy or being saddled with huge amounts of debt.

Recently, I sat down to write Justin’s father a thank-you note. It took many tries to articulate my profound gratitude to Mr. Irvine.

The final draft came back to those four words, “Go to your destiny.” This was not some bout of predetermined fate; it was a call to go out and to shape a destiny; to do something great, to create a positive legacy because his story also reminds us that our lives don’t last forever.

After many failed attempts to put my thoughts on paper, I realized that the narrative of my Illinois experience, the nurturing of a hopeful destiny, was the most genuine thanks I could give. My Illinois education was again advancing Justin’s legacy.

I’d like to share a similar narrative with you – emphasizing that this is just one narrative among thousands across this campus.

I came to Illinois with two pretty lofty goals: First, I wanted to boot a few game-winning field goals for the Fighting Illini. Second, I wanted to take advantage of a world-class education to, as cliché as it sounds, change the world.

I walked on to the football team and poured my heart into making my dream of kicking a few through the uprights for the orange and blue a reality. It never happened. After 15 months, I walked in to Coach Zook’s office with tears in my eyes. It had been the opportunity of a lifetime. True, I wasn’t exactly Neil Rackers or Jason Reda, but the final factor was simply that the classroom and the research lab had pulled me away from this dream toward stronger, more pressing dreams—those dreams of an enduring contribution—a legacy that for the first time, I felt capable of achieving with my developing Illinois education. This University had just offered me too much.

When choosing colleges, I was determined to study forestry. As a side note, that meant out-of-state tuition right off the bat since Kansas isn’t exactly known for its abundant forests! The science was intriguing, and more importantly, even as a naïve high school senior, I had managed to grasp the general idea that advances in forestry could make a lot of lives better.

And of all places to study forestry, I chose central Illinois. After carefully considering forestry programs out west, and several other more sizeable programs at Big 10 universities, I decided the small forest science program at Illinois was a perfect fit. And it could not have worked out any better, thanks to one particular faculty member.
Just a few months before ending my football career (during summer workouts) I took a job working under the supervision of a young faculty member, Dr. Courtney Flint, a social scientist focusing on forestry and natural resource issues.

One of my first tasks was the seemingly meaningless one of data entry for returned mail surveys from Colorado where trees were dying from bark beetles. Whole mountainsides were, and still are, turning the characteristic red and then grey of dead forests. I knew it was going to be more stimulating than I had originally bargained for after recording just one survey booklet’s free response answer: the space was filled with huge capital letters and numerous exclamation points showing complete panic, frustration, and even anger at losing their forests.

Later that same summer, Dr. Flint assigned me to review the current state of forestry in southern Illinois as part of another project. This work took me to the hills and woods of the southernmost part of Illinois, including the University’s own Dixon Springs Agricultural Center. I interviewed forest managers and landowners around pickup trucks and dining room tables. Again, I heard loud and clear that people loved their forests. In southern Illinois, forests and natural scenery seemed even more crucial in that they contributed a huge economic boost to an economically depressed region. Forests help to support hunters, horseback riders, hikers, plus logging and much more. Not only are they beautiful, forests mean livelihoods, too!

In my mind, Dr. Flint’s research was pretty cool stuff -- bringing real voices of real people in real places to the table. But that wasn’t all.

When I had this oddball idea of skipping out on Big 10 football for Big 10 forestry, Dr. Flint’s only concern was taking my mind off the stress of the situation by inviting me to dinner at the Flints. Ping-pong with her two sons, Jack and Doug, was quite an effective stress reliever. Likewise, when I decided to cut back on paid hours to do independent research, Dr. Flint took much more interest than I could have ever expected. Needless to say, it wasn’t a hard decision to stay at Illinois and work with Dr. Flint when she mentioned graduate school.

Thinking back to Justin, continuing Justin’s legacy by studying forestry may not have been the most logical choice. However, with so many people depending on our forests not only for simple beauty but also for their livelihoods and in some extreme cases (most notably sub-Saharan Africa) even sustaining life itself, it’s a legacy that I’m thrilled to strive to continue.

Will my career have a hand in crafting the most beneficial forest policy? I have confidence. Will my career help capture the synergies between environment, community, and economy? I have confidence. Will this translate to making lives better around me? Again, I have confidence.

Most of all, this narrative of a kid from nowhere Kansas living the Illinois dream - and the thousands of narratives like it - would not exist without you. I thank you for providing the resources to make this possible: the generous donations to build state-of-the-art facilities, to recruit world-class faculty, and to provide the financial aid necessary to fill this University’s halls with the best and brightest. Even more so, I thank you for simply having confidence in this generation.

While we college students cannot begin to parallel what you’ve done financially, not yet, I assure you we recognize the power of our educations and our ideas to continue the tradition of giving.

In memory of Justin, I thank you for empowering all of us to go to our respective destinies.

clear