Graduation Speech : High School

My sophomore year at Central High School did not start out the best. I was recovering from an awful grade point average, awful for me at least, I was sitting the bench in a sport that I had lost interest in, and overall I just did not enjoy school anymore. I personally did not see the point in coming to school at all. It took some time, but I finally started to get my grades up, my season had ended for football, and I knew I was not going back. After everything was starting to go my way I started thinking, “What am I going to do next?”

Some point in your life you fail, but everyone always learns from their mistakes. Our failures help mold us into the people we are today. We all have these experiences, but it is how you deal with them and moves past it. The first semester of my junior year was one of the toughest times for me. I lost all motivation. I felt as if anything I did didn’t matter. Everything was confusing, nothing was ever enough. Classes were challenging; I was physically there, but mentally I would be in a different world. I didn’t care about anything that happened. I had no idea how to cope with anything. My grades slipped, and I knew that didn’t reflect who I actually was. There were countless times, throughout that semester that I tried to fix my grades. Yet

High school is supposed to be the place where you have fun and a time in your life you’re supposed to enjoy. Movies often trick you into believing that high school is an amazing time in your life and there is nothing but parties and fun. In Bring it on, they portrayed the fun and exciting part of high school cheer-leading, however they intentionally leave out the tough times high school students’ face in school and in their practices. In other popular movies, such as High School Musical the students have no pressures other than the next basketball game. In reality, this doesn 't happen. The constant pressure is affected by the grade level you are in. In high school, students can be classified based on the pressures that are faced in each grade level into the categories of freshman, sophomores/juniors, and seniors. I am here to help you make your high school experience less stressful.

High school has been a pathway full of barriers that have brought me to sudden halts when I happened to least expect them. My freshman year was smooth as could be, but early my sophomore year all hell broke loose when a custody battle was unleashed between my adoptive parents. I practically cut ties with the man who stood as a father figure of mine since I had lost my mother. He was my mother's father, and saying goodbye to him was saying farewell to the last person that I was connected to by blood. This was losing a father all over again, but this time I grasped an understanding of what was occurring. My junior year was a fresh start, to getting back on track. Everything went as planned until my second semester I was set back again, this time it was mononucleosis that stood in my path for half of a year. Half a year of education is invaluable. I regrettably failed two classes that I was extremely passionate about, chemistry and English. Although the most successful people not always had the best grades while in school, but they had the most ambition.

I was an average student in high school. I took a few challenging and AP courses, but I wasn’t an overachiever who earned an A in every course, however, I also wasn’t failing any of my class. I was the student who did the minimum work that was needed to pass the course. This eventually resulted in meeting with my assigned school counselor only once a year because it was mandatory. However, during my junior year I really began to focus on my future because I knew my years as a high school was coming to an end. But because I didn’t have a relationship with my assigned school counselor, whom I felt was too busy with other students on her caseload because her office door was often close, I chose to seek out to another school counselor on campus. The high school counselor who helped answer my questions regarding college and gave me information about the SAT test dates and fee wavier was Mr. Rios. Due to help I received from Mr. Rios, I later joined the school volunteer club Mr. Rios was the faculty staff in charge of that later helped me build my resume, life experiences, and network. With the relationship with Mr. Rios, I chose to interview him because he inspires me to continue working hard in graduate school so that I too, can have a similar position like him as a high school counselor in the near future.

Over the last few years of high school I feel like I changed in a positive way because in the beginning of my freshmen year of high school, I didn’t really think of how much my grades would affect my chances of graduating and going to college. I didn’t think I would make it this far and it didn’t matter to me because dropping out and getting a GED seemed like an easy way out for me at the time. But I realized that life could be hard out there. If you can just finish school, work on getting your diploma and maybe go to college and the real world and all you’ll have is GED that gets you little job opportunities when study for what you’d want to do for a career. Every time I felt discouraged, I told my teachers “Hey, I don’t think I can do this. I give up”. They made sure I got my work turned in on time to my class, because those teachers cared about my education, and at the end of the day when school is over and I’m going home, I think about all the homework I have to do and tests I have to study for.

When I was in high school I wanted to be like everybody else. I wanted to fit in and meet some new friends. With meeting new friends I met the good ones and the bad ones. What I didn’t realize at that time was the bad ones were only going to bring me down and make me skip school.

dad had been hired at a company nearby, and Saline was said to be one of the best school districts in the state. At Saline, I grew in my love of reading and most everything else (expect for math), and the classes offered there challenged me to work hard. In high school, I enrolled in all the honors courses I could, taking math a year above the majority of my class and studying hard. My school offered many AP classes, and because of the classes I took there, I entered IUS in my first year as a sophomore according to my credits. No matter what, I know education is important to me and that I will continue in my education for many years. I’m good at school, though sometimes I worry that it’s not so much that I am intelligent than it is that I know how to give people what they want.

So far I have had many challenges related to school, work, and my personal life. School does not come naturally to me, but no matter what I try my hardest. A 3.6 GPA might me average or even low considered to some people but to me it is an accomplishment. I work hard for my grades and I will continue to do so throughout my time at school. Working 30 hours a week and going to school full-time is a huge battle for me, but it has taught me a lot. It’s all about time management, no matter what I know that I have to get my assignments in on time and to study for exams, so I always make that my first priority. Working has also taught me that I have to be responsible for myself and that nobody is going to take the blame for me, after a few months I learned how to be a more independent person, I believe that this will help me tremendously in the business world. One way that I try to help myself out is by having my

Some of the greatest successes I have experienced during my school year were being in Honor Society, being awarded a 4.0 G.P.A medal and being awarded the Spirit of Chelan certificate. Ever since I was in elementary school I strived to be a good student. My father was my main motivator I wanted him to feel proud of me. After my father passed away I made him a promise to always give my best and get straight A's. When I was awarded a 4.0 medal I felt the happiest girl alive. Not because I had gotten good grades , but because I was keeping my dad the promise I made him . I still mark this as the greatest success in my life. The second greatest achievement was being part of Honor Society. Through Honor Society I was able to bond with my community and meet various people. I was able to help in the Chelan Valley Hope and provide food and resources to low income families. Lastly, being nominated and awarded for the Spirit of Chelan award. Spirit of Chelan award is awarded to a person who shows outstanding leadership. Someone who represents the Chelan Valley responsibly and respectfully. This meant a lot to me because I felt like I was contributing to my community in a positive way. I felt proud that all my hard work was all worth it. Some of the struggles I experience is being able to manage my homework with helping my family financially. Currently I struggle with managing my time efficiently. After college I go and babysit 4 kids until 10 pm. I find myself often doing my

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.

It is often believed that during high school, everyone changes, wither it’s in a good way or a bad way, we all change. I was that typical high school cheerleader that didn’t care about her grades, I just wanted to have fun with friends and brush by school with C’s, but I was okay with it during those times.

“The future belongs to the nation that best educates its citizens. We have everything we need to be that nation … and yet, despite resources that are unmatched anywhere in the world, we have let our grades slip, our schools crumble, our teacher’s quality fall short and other nations outpace us”-President Obama (Splitt).

High School graduation can be an exciting time in a student’s life. It is a time in their lives where they begin to experience the kind of freedom that comes along with growing up. This freedom allows students to choose the type of college or University they would like to attend. It is necessary that they understand how responsible they need to be with the freedom that is being offered to them. When choosing what college or university to attend it may be tempting to want to go to a school that is known more for the party scene however, it is important to keep in mind that to have a bright future, going to a party school may not be what is best for them today. When looking into a colleges or universities it is imperative to ask oneself three questions, are the students attending the school learning anything; what is the failure rate of the school they are looking into; and what is the schools average cost of tuition.

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.