Dr. E. Gaylon McCollough, founding and leading surgeon at McCollough Plastic Surgery, encouraged Troy University graduates to be lifelong learners and challenged them to always approach life with a can-do attitude with the willingness to go above and beyond what is expected of them.

Speaking to 360 graduates taking part in the summer commencement ceremony inside Trojan Arena, McCollough said that education is a never-ending process. He reminded graduates that lessons to be learned are not limited to the classroom setting.

“In addition to the lessons that accompany a formal education, expect supplementary lessons to come from what is known as the school of hard knocks, an unconventional institution of learning from which my parents and many of their generation graduated,” he said. “In their case, the classrooms and laboratories were located not far from here on the farms and the construction sites of Coffee County and extended to the battlefields of World War II. I'm forever grateful that my parents insisted that I experience various elements of that same curriculum.”