Graduation Speech Essay

WOW! So much has happened since June. The SV FFA and ag department had a rough start to our year losing three of our students who were on the FFA officer team to other schools. Even with this bump in the road, the four officers that remained visited Mt. Shasta City and had a blast bonding and learning more about each other at their officer retreat in August. Once school started we found three new officers and attended COLC (Chapter Officer Leadership Conference) where the entire team learned about their diverse leadership styles and were able to bond together as the official Surprise Valley FFA Chapter Officer Team for the 2017-2018 school year. If you see them around, congratulate President Cindy Hinze, V.P. Maddison Seely, Secretary Maya

Well, this is it. These are the only seniors who were able to survive the culminating exhibition. If I had known that there would be this many open seats, I would have invited my third cousins from Norway. You know, it's funny. As I look around at the familiar faces in the student section, I am reminded about something. Our class, particularly the girls, have been very fashion-conscious over the last four years. Some even seem to be in competition with one another. Well girls, here we are on the most important day of your high school careers, and you're all wearing the same thing. The guys, on the other hand, could care less. I know for a fact that a couple of you aren't wearing anything underneath your tailored tarps.

[Go up with Senior Homecoming t-shirt and hold up front and back so everyone can see]

Dreams. The dictionary's definition of a dream is "To have great ambition or to really hope for something". Well, I say make those ambitions a reality and hope active.

A wise person once said something to this effect: "Quotes are just another way of masking one's true feelings." I'd tell you the person who wrote it, but I can barely even remember it word for word. It's funny I crossed paths with this quote just days before I was informed I would be speaking at commencement. Someone or something, maybe a higher power, meant for this quote and I to meet. The irony of the whole situation is that the author's quote was turned into a quote, which is most likely the opposite of their intentions.

The old poet Kahlil Gibran, a long time ago, once said, "You work that you may keep pace with the soul of the earth. For to be idle is to become a stranger unto the seasons, and to step out of life's procession, that marches in majesty and proud submission toward the infinite." An interesting thought, that we work in order to keep pace with the earth. Now, I'm sure you're asking yourself, how can my near minimum wage job, where the customers treat me like a doormat and I still have to be pleasant and chipper, keep me in sync with the soul of the earth. Well I imagine there are higher rewards to part-time high school jobs, but other than the always too small pay checks, I am hard pressed to fathom them. Yet, that is not the kind of work I

Well, this is it. Our last night. The last page of the scrapbook we call high school. Our scrapbooks are filled with memories from the first day we walked into these halls ... to this very night. Pictures crammed in, ticket stubs nestled between them, adorned by dried corsages and newspaper clippings, yellowed with every fond recollection.

Henry Adams once wrote "A teacher affects eternity; he can never tell where his influence stops." This is so true, every teacher here has taught us much more than the textbook curriculum. Every teacher here tonight has given us students something we will use or remember for the rest of our lives. I really don't think people understand or appreciate the time and effort our teachers have put into us. So tonight I'm not going to give everyone advice on the future, I'm not going to tell you how life is a journey we've just begun, and I'm not going to brag about how great the class of 2006 is. Since we have eight outstanding Valedictorians this year, I'm sure all of those bases are already covered. So instead, I'm going to take a few minutes

I agonized over writing this speech for a long time, because I felt like nothing I could say would make a difference, first because I don't know if what I could say would be good advice, and second because I don't know if advice about things like being true to yourself and setting goals and all that is actually helpful. How can I give advice that I can't even follow in my own life? And even if you are mesmerized for my two minutes, you would walk out of here and your life wouldn't be any different. Or maybe you'd be inspired for a day, and then forget. But still, the speech had to be written.

I want to thank my family for giving me the opportunity to receive a private education and for encouraging me to always do my best. Thank you to my friends and their parents who have loved me and believed in me. Most of all, I want to say thanks to God for giving me the gifts He has and for loving me unconditionally; for without Him, I am nothing.

Good evening, ladies and gentlemen. On behalf of the 2012 graduating class of County High School, I would like to welcome you to our commencement ceremony. As valedictorian of this class I would like to speak to you, and my fellow graduates about responsibility, but first I would like to tell you a little story

I rediscovered something while trying to think of my speech for tonight. History repeats itself. Everything I felt compelled to say I knew has been said before and will be said in times to come. I grew dismayed at the thought that the human race has progressed so little that the same advice has as much merit now as it did when it was first given, millenniums ago. Yet there is a simple beauty in this. It reassures us that humans will always be human; that everyone is experiencing life for the first time, no matter how many ancestors lie before them. Since we are each seeing life anew, the same truths will occur again and again. These truths have brought us to this point in history; they will carry us for the rest of our lives.

Are we there yet? Have we reached our destination? We've been traveling for 13 long years. We've only had a few brief rests along the way. We're tired and we're cranky and we just want to know, are we there yet?

At Carthage High School there are two very distinct categories that students are a part of: “Hispanic” and “everyone else”. Over the past decade the school district has seen a dramatic increase in the number of Hispanic students that are being enrolled in our district. There have been numerous attempts to help meet the needs of our Hispanic students, most of them are English Language Learners (ELL), and while there has been progress made, there is much more that our school could be doing for these students. Data from state test results and annual yearly reporting (AYP) show our minority students are making progress but still fall significantly behind the non-ELL peers. Teachers are the key to seeing our Hispanic students achieve higher rates of success because they have the largest effect on the daily motivation and learning of these students in the classroom. Using interviews, observations, and artifacts produced by students my action research plan will show successful methods being used in the classroom and which methods are not helping to achieve the desired results for our students. My action research plan will also help bring to light the social issues that are being dealt with in our school and building as a direct result of the influx of diversity in our community and school. Our school is trying to aid in this area by introducing programs aimed at helping bridge the gap between the diverse cultures in our community. These programs will be reviewed to see if

Entering college introduces students to several challenges that go further than high school academics. First- year students are to understand a new social environment they are in, try and fit in with other at the new institution, adapt to new things and responsibilities, comprehend the distance from hometown friends and family, involve yourself in the career of your choice (Credé, & Niehorster 2011). Students struggle with the transition from high school to college. Many students do not believe that the transition is hard from going to high school then to college.