The University of Huddersfield’s graduates have been encouraged to follow their dreams by the recipients of honorary doctorates awarded during the July graduation fortnight.
July’s honoraries included broadcaster and Huddersfield alumni Adil Ray OBE, who looked back to his time at the University in the 1990s by saying that it was the whole experience, including what he did outside of lectures, that was just as important as his Business degree.
Acting, writing award-winning comedy, holding politicians to account on breakfast TV and making hard-hitting documentaries make Adil a true all-rounder of the modern media landscape. He graduated in Marketing from Huddersfield in 1997 having arrived here through Clearing.
He wrote and starred in the highly-successful BBC sitcom Citizen Khan, appeared in the acclaimed drama Stephen about the murder of Stephen Lawrence, hosts Good Morning Britain on ITV and recently presented the thought-provoking documentary Is Cricket Racist on Channel 4.
This eclectic career had its roots when he attended Huddersfield, when his spell as a DJ at the Student’s Union helped inspire his early career after graduating.
“I’ll ask anyone graduating what their next dream is because they absolutely can do it. My advice is to a small thing every day towards that dream, that could be send an email, apply for a job, just five minutes of your day even on weekends or birthdays. But if you do that every day, it becomes part of yourself, and if you’re honest with yourself then there is only one way and that is that your dream can come true.
“I grew up thinking that if I saw somebody who was a comedian, I thought that I’d like to do that. Doing a documentary? I want to do that.
“I feel ‘Why not?’ If you want to become a footballer, then then try to learn to be a footballer. If you want to be an architect, then do it. Just keep your eyes and ears open and go for it and really live your dreams.”
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