Karl Adam on stage at the Oakland University commencement April 29.

By Susan Bromley

Staff Writer

Public speaking is difficult for most people, including Karl Adam.

The Brandon Township resident was nervous as he stood on stage at the Oakland University commencement April 29 and launched into a speech that didn’t look toward the future, but instead gave thanks to what put him there.

“I have a lot of things to be thankful for as I stand up here,” he said. “I’m thankful to Professor Rigstad and Professor Martin who nominated me for the honor of speaking to you all. I’m thankful that I’ll never have to fill out another scan tron for the rest of my life. I’m thankful that because I’m a blind person who can’t drive, I’ve never had to find somewhere to park at Oakland University. But most of all, I’m thankful for all the people who made it possible for me to spend years studying things I love at a wonderfully supportive place and leave with an excellent education.”

Adam, who has been blind since birth, indeed had support, but what he accomplished, a bachelor’s degree with three majors, is extraordinary even for a sighted person and for that amazing feat, he was honored with the College of Arts and Sciences Meritorious Achievement Award, one of just two given this year.

Adam said he was honored to receive the award and surprised when his professors asked if they could nominate him.

“Karl is a student of exceedingly rare qualities and displays a remarkably wide range of interdisciplinary erudition for a scholar of his age,” wrote Associate Professor and chair of The Department of Philosophy Mark Rigstad, Ph.D., in his award nomination letter. “He is the best student that I have had the privilege to teach since coming to Oakland University more than a decade ago.”

Adam, who was homeschooled for his K-12 education, achieved his associate’s degree at Oakland Community College and arrived at OU unsure of the subject in which he wanted to major.

He began with philosophy, but realized with all of his credits from OCC, he only had to take a few more classes at OU to also have a major in history, which Adam adds was very useful for the philosophy as he read about the history of philosophers including Plato, Aristotle, Kant and Hume.

Likewise, with a few more classes, he could  major as well in anthropology, which he also deems useful for the philosophy.

“A lot of philsophers often make assumptions when they talk about things that are very ethnocentric,” said Adam. “They talk about ethics and politics, but they don’t know how it works in other societies besides their own. In anthropology, you talk about family and here is how it works in other societies, the same with economics in other places and other times. I think that it is very important to have a sense of options in the world.”

Adam started his studies at OU in 2012 and notes it took him “quite a while” to accomplish the triple major, but he loves school in spite of the challenges he encountered because of his disability. The biggest hardship, he said, was getting books, articles and materials in a readable format. Braille is not always easy to come by. Adam adds that if the information is computerized, he has access to technology that will read the text to him, but often he had to have someone scan books for him. He also struggled with information relayed in tables, graphs, or charts and dictating complicated info to those assisting him to put information in those same formats, particularly if they weren’t familiar with the subjects.

“My Mom was really helpful, but most people don’t have a mother who can spend hours and hours of their time doing this during the school year,” said Adam, whose mother also drove him to school. “I was lucky.”

“Sir Isaac Newton once said that if he had seen farther than others it was because he stood on the shoulders of giants,” said Adam in his OU speech. “But he isn’t the only one. All scholarship involves building on the work of those who came before and at its best makes the tower of human knowledge a tiny fraction higher. But it’s not only scholars and scientists either. Each of us graduates stands on the shoulders of many people. There are our friends and families who support us, cheer us up when we’re down, sometimes help pay our tuition, and are generally there for us when we need them. There are all the faculty who push us to learn and to think and to grow.”

Adam will continue his journey this fall, moving south with his fiancee, Megan Turner, as he pursues his Ph.D. in philosophy at the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill.