Degrees Don’t Define Us
A week ago, I received my Bachelor’s diploma in History — a moment I was lucky enough to share with people who have walked beside me through different chapters of my life. It was lovely, meaningful, and full of warmth. There is something undeniably sweet about seeing your name printed on official paper, even if the paper itself is just a slightly fancier cousin of what any office printer could produce. The ceremony, the applause, the hugs — all of that felt real, grounding, almost ceremonial in a way that surprised me. For a brief moment, it felt as though the years of reading, writing, doubting, and persevering had crystallized into something tangible.
And yet, if I am honest, the degree itself does not carry the weight people often assign to it. I hesitate to say this aloud, because I know how much effort goes into earning a degree, and I don’t wish to diminish anyone’s achievement, including my own. I wrote the essays, survived the deadlines, and even pretended to understand Derrida on days when my brain was operating at the level of a sleepy houseplant. I navigated seminars, footnotes, and the occasional existential crisis that comes free of charge with any degree program. But even with all that, I cannot pretend that academic titles are the ultimate measure of a person’s worth.
When I think about contribution, I think of my grandfather. He was a farmer. He could not read or write. His knowledge lived in his hands — in the way he made wine and schnaps, in the way he cared for his animals, in the way he rose every morning at five without complaint. (Meanwhile, I rise at five only if I’m catching a flight.) He was the most consistent person I have ever known, and he never needed a diploma to prove it. His competence was measured in harvests, not credits; in the trust of his animals, not in academic supervisors. His life was a rhythm, a steady pulse of work and care and responsibility, the kind of rhythm that shapes a person from the inside out.
And the idea that a degree makes someone “more valuable” than him is something I simply cannot accept. If someone tried to argue that point with me, I would politely disagree — and by “politely disagree,” I mean I would stare at them with the same expression my grandfather used when someone suggested adding water to wine. A look that says: I hear you, but you are deeply, profoundly wrong. A look that contains a lifetime of quiet certainty, the kind that doesn’t need to raise its voice to be convincing.
If anything, this diploma reminds me that education is only one form of knowledge, and academic achievement only one form of contribution. The world is built just as much by people like my grandfather — people whose lives never appear in university records, yet whose dignity, labor, and love shape everything around us. They are the ones who keep communities alive, who feed us, who repair what breaks, who pass down wisdom that cannot be footnoted. Their knowledge is embodied, lived, and transmitted through gestures and habits rather than citations and conferences.
My diploma may grant me access to certain spaces, and my voice may resonate with some audiences, but it is a farmer’s hands that laid the foundation for all of it. His work created the stability from which my opportunities grew. And if I ever forget that, I hope someone stops me — long before I start believing my own importance, long before I mistake academic fluency for moral superiority. Humility, after all, is also a form of intelligence.
In the end, this degree is a milestone, not a hierarchy. A celebration, not a certificate of superiority. It is a reminder of how many different kinds of intelligence exist in the world, and how many of them never sit in a classroom. Some are learned through books, others through soil. Some through theory, others through repetition, patience, and the quiet courage of showing up every day.
And honestly, I just wish my grandfather were here with me. Because even now — diploma in hand, surrounded by scholars — he would still hold more wisdom in the creases of his palms than most people ever manage to learn. His lessons came through rhythm and routine, through the quiet certainty of someone who knows the world by working with it, not theorizing about it. If I carry anything forward, I hope it is that kind of groundedness — the kind that keeps ambition humble and gratitude close, the kind that reminds me that knowledge is richest when it is shared, lived, and rooted in something deeper than achievement.
