Graduation Speech : High School

I have been going to school since I was four years old and, that means that I have been attending school twenty to twenty two years, including kindergarten, middle school, high school and now college. As every student, I had my ups and downs in school; I had some failures and some successes. One of the failures that affected me the most and that I will always remember was the time that I was in high school during my junior year. I failed almost all my classes and, I only passed two classes and with a C. In the other hand I had some really good success. The most recent one and the one that I am still happy about is getting my Family Development Credential. We learn from our mistakes and also from our successes, these two times in my life

“Congratulations! You have been accepted to Bentley University for fall of 2015!” Words could not express how ecstatic this message made me. As soon as the acceptance email popped up on my phone, I screamed, dropped my backpack, and sprinted over to my track and field teammates to celebrate this triumphant occasion. After years of challenging AP courses, eleven seasons of tiring school sports, and countless extracurricular clubs, I finally felt like all of my hard work had paid off. At that moment, the only thought in my head was “I’m going to Bentley!” My dream — an aspiration I’ve had since my freshman year of high school — was becoming a reality.

As a freshman in high school, school was my least favorite place to be and I also dislike going to class. My grades were inadequate by the time I was a sophomore. Toward the end of my sophomore year I met Dawn Pollman Kivlehan who is a teacher at Fowler High School. She is the head of the ESL (English as a Second Language) department. Mrs. Kivlehan was born and raised in Syracuse, New York and lived in a neighborhood called Tipperary Hill. She enjoyed in spending time with her family, listening to music and watching Fowler soccer. She had a bad habit of drinking Diet Pepsi every morning. I remember every morning she drinks Pepsi. She played field hockey in college and basketball in her early age. Her eyes changes color depending on the clothes she wears and, then green when she’s upset. Mrs. Dawn is fashionable during the week she always dressed up except Fridays. Friday she wears her soccer t-shirts. (She really loves wearing sweatpants after work). Dawn Pollman Kivlehan is hardworking, helpful, and very beloved teacher. (I can really say that she is one of the hardest working person I know)

Every year the percentage of high school graduates going to college after high school rises. But as the number of students increases, so does college tuition. In 2013-14 there was a 9% rise in CSU tuition with the average rise being 7% a year. As College prices rise, more student loans are withdrawn to help pay for increased tuition. Student debt isn’t like credit card debt or medical bills or a mortgage, where if you declare bankruptcy all your debt will be forgiven. Student loans stick with you until they are payed off in full plus interest. As a high school student who hopes to go to college in 2-3 years, I don’t know if I am really ready to assume thousands of dollars in student loans. So although colleges have had to raise prices due

High school was one of the most challenging moments in my life. Not only did I have to deal with the academic pressures and social issues from my peers I had external factors that were heavily impacting me as well. During my junior year my mom separated from her husband and me and my three little brothers ended up staying house to house with close relatives. Shortly after that time at the beginning of my senior year, my mom was sent to prison. In the midst of dealing with all of the demands that any senior deals with I had to also carry the responsibility of taking care of my three siblings. I picked up more hours from my part time job and had help from my stepdad and extended family financially but my little brothers were depending on me psychologically. Times were tough. At times my attention shifted away from my academics and more so to the wants and needs of my siblings. I became so stressed out that I broke down and went to visit my high school counselor. She then recommended me to my school’s district Social Worker.

In the beginning of 8th grade we were asked to write a letter to ourselves explaining how our year was going so far. You were to write the letter, place it in an envelope and open it on the last day of school. Although it was a mandatory assignment, I enjoyed reading my opinions from the first couple days of school and I thought I would write one again. This week I completed my first week of high school, and I thought I would share my POV so that I could later look back on this and see how a “naive” freshman saw things.

My legs where tired, my mind was racing, my hands were shaking, and I had nowhere to run. Walking up the stairs to a pair of large glass doors just terrified me. I know I was going to be able to survive. I had to; there is no other way. Every step I took towards the entry way I could feel my heart rate accelerated as I cautiously looked around for a seat. I sat in the third row of an auditorium looking room. There were around twenty to thirty people sitting around looking at a blank projection screen waiting for my new teacher to arrive. In my head I had a description of a college professor which would be a older gentleman with brown laptop case and look intimidating and make me want to cry on the first day by assigning paper after paper for the enjoyment of watching me fail. I didn 't feel prepared at all high school was so different students didn 't live there and no one to remind students to do all homework the homework there assigned. My high school failed to prepare me because in high school we didn’t receive homework, and didn’t mentally prepare me for the new independence that I now possess.

College hasn’t really been much of a choice for me—same way for walking the stage at graduation in high school. Yeah the “option” to opt out has “always” been there, but God forbid I get to make my own choices as an adult by my mother (but that’s something else entirely). My relatives’ continuous badgering, threats, and my patience running out after fifteen years of their actions “convinced” me to start to college anyways. I mustn’t leave out the fact that I also convinced myself that if I started college early, I would potentially graduate around the same time as one of my favorite cousins and one of my friends. I started taking dual credit courses in high school to shut my mother up about advanced schooling, ended up liking the teachers

In the year 2012, I was supposed to be excited and proud of myself. 2012 was the year that I graduated from high school. During the time following up to my graduation I was living in the moment I was pumped up because I was going to be done with high school. High school is known for being the best time of anyone’s life, and indeed it was. Well the time came around for me to check out of all my classes and the final thing was to practice for the actual graduation. Life seem to change more and more it started to feel more and more real. I realize that I was no longer going to be a young teen I was growing up. I had to start to think about college and work all these things were running through my head as I was practicing for graduation. I decide to stop thinking about that and just enjoy the moment. Well the day finally came for the big day I had my graduation and let me tell you it felt so unreal I never seen so many proud parents cheer and yelling when they heard the child’s name being announced as they received their diploma.

their high school diploma. When P-TECH initially started, it included on grade 9 and added a grade every year until it became a complete high school. The focus of P-TECH is to provide students with college level work in high school so they can earn their Associate degree at City Tech in what are called the grade 13 and 14. In personal interview with Mr. Brian Donnelly, the Deputy Director of Early College Initiative at CUNY, he described that in students who are part of P-TECH experience grades 13 and 14, which entails that they are still a high school student because they have some high school requirements left and also have not completed the CUNY proficiencies. However, students are still taking college courses and therefore can complete up to an Associate’s degree in CUNY. Currently, the grade 14 has not been added to the P-TECH schools, but this will added within the next upcoming year.

In 2010, Grant High School, set out to improve (Lambertson 42-43). This school quickly went from being in the worst 5% of schools in Michigan to the superior 92% (Lambertson 43-45). This school poured effort into its programs to try to bring up test grades (Lambertson 42-45). Amazingly, Grant High School brought its average ACT score up 2.4 points in around three years (Lambertson 45). However, in the end, was this school successful? Were its students prepared to succeed?

When a student enrolls into high school, there are several transitions to make. There are much more classes to take, people to meet, and goals to reach; including tests such as the SAT. The general high school experience can be overwhelming for some students. However, how well a student can succeed and will ever succeed will begin to be determined here. It is a priority that parents play a dramatic role in their child’s high school career. Parents and high school students nationwide of low socioeconomic class, low education level, or an unstable family should be informed of the long term benefits education has to offer because it would drastically decrease the rate of high school dropouts. High school dropout rates nationwide may be

Good morning, how is everyone today? Wonderful! I am glad you all are well. I hope you did your homework last night! If you did, you will be getting a gold star on your homework worksheet. Anyways, let us begin our day with the bell ringer. Please complete the three math problems that are on the board. You must do these by yourself... and yes, that includes you Jonathan. You don 't want me to have another conference with your mother, right? That 's what I thought. You will all have ten minutes, so go ahead and begin. We will go over them together after time is up. They will help us review our long division, which I introduced yesterday. If you have any questions, please raise your hand.

As spring comes to an end and summer is soon to begin, many high school seniors will embark on their last true summer before going off to college. Many of these kids may be receiving a scholarship or a grant, or a bill to help pay for school, and have to pay the rest out of pocket to cover the remaining expenses. With the economy still not being as strong as it once was, and many people trimming down their budgets, economic resources may be scarce, many people resort to the only choice they have left and take out student loans. Which in essence is what is crippling our economy.

When you think of students in college you think of hard homework assignments, long essays with short due dates, the last minute studying for exams and of course the partying that everyone looks forward to when it comes to being in college. Do you ever think about what happens when you don’t do the homework, not turn in the essay on time and do horrible on the exams and party a little too much? When this happens, grades tend to fall and when grades tend to fall it usually means you’re not doing what you’re supposed to be doing, and when you’re paying thousands of dollars for an education most people can’t afford to take college as a game being played. For most students they don’t have a choice but to drop out because of all these outcomes.