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

Throughout life people go through so many adversities. Whether it be good or bad there is always something that arises out of the situation. One of the most thrilling, but yet frightening events to take place throughout someone’s life would be graduation. For many people, graduating from high school is an objective. It takes a lot of time, effort, and determination to accomplish that goal. For others graduation is the end of high school, and the beginning of a new chapter in life. When graduated people feel as if adulthood has begun. In the long run, graduating opens a lot of opportunities for people to thrive.

Early teenagers look forward to one thing during their final year in middle school, high school. Some high school graduates may consider those four years the best years of their life because of the minimal stress and care free living. The purpose that high school serves in the twenty first century is to prepare students for college. A few minor reasons for high school are preparation for the workforce, community building, and socialization. With approximately only twenty five percent of freshmen classes graduating, the high school education is in danger. A high school diploma in the twenty first century is a necessity. According to Koenig, “high school dropouts make $200,000 less than a high school graduate in a life span” (76). As poverty increases, the high school drop out rate is increasing as well. Many high school dropouts do not fully understand the importance of a high school diploma. The outcome of not receiving a high school diploma should be made visual through a students time spent in school. The high school education is in jeopardy because of family background, students themselves, and academics.

It was my senior year in high school and graduation was inching closer and closer. My high school principal stood on the stage of our auditorium introducing me as the recipient of the Principals Hall of Fame Award. As he stated proudly “Desiree aspires to return to North Miami Beach Senior High to teach science” it was hard for me to conceal my shock. How had he misinterpreted my future plans into becoming an educator and even more, to returning to my high school? I was sure that this was all a misunderstanding and I would continue on towards becoming the Neonatologist I had always dreamed of, still connected to children but only in the first moments of their lives. Little did I know, my principal was more in tuned to my destiny than I thought. I look back on this moment and it supports my belief that education has always been my calling.

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

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.

The average person has a very limited mortality, so why would someone spend most of their time in school and accrue debt that will take years to pay off? People in general go to college to better themselves and accomplish what one wants out of life. What’s better way for a person to live life and experience it to the fullest than to do the dream job they want, or have a reserve of wealth that they can spend according to how they see fit? According to one’s parents or their teachers getting an education can indeed be the key to a higher quality of life, but obtaining a higher education is a facade masked by the propaganda of the media and one’s mentors. Going to college will make things more complicated and create more problems than it solves.

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

The most anticipated moment in High School occurs at the start of Junior year; students come to the realization that college is right around the corner, so they must begin their college research. Some High Schools hosts college fairs or college visits which would help students begin their college research. There are many factors that must be considered when choosing the right college such as cost of tuition; location; academics; wide range of majors, and most importantly if you meet the requirements. One major fact that either prevents or encourages a student to apply to a specific University is the acceptance rate. If the acceptance rate is low, like Stanford (the acceptance rate in 2016 was 4.8%) High School seniors are less likely to apply. Students also have to carefully choose the colleges they want to apply to because college application are expensive, averaging ninety dollars per application. The minimum number of colleges that students are told to apply to varies from counselor to counselor. Students could always apply to more colleges but the application fees add up. Therefore, students tend to gravitate towards colleges that they have a higher chance of getting accepted into. A plan that has been implemented in several universities called The Affirmative Action plan promises to increase diversity on college campuses and ensuring racial and gender inclusion. For example, there would be an increase of minorities on campus. With this in mind, more minority students

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.

The teenage years a is time in which high school students are faced with important decisions and are becoming young adults. This is an important transition in life. Post-secondary education is critical, as a matter of fact, it is a credential crucial for economic success; inevitably, in some cases, it is the opposite. As pressure intensifies near the end of high school, it is essential for students to unconventionally take time off school -- not learning -- before proceeding on to postsecondary education, to ensure a promising future.

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.

With regards to high school graduation, Balfanz, Herzog, and Iver (2007) followed 12,972 Philadelphia students enrolled in traditional middle schools from six grade (1996-1997) until 1 year beyond their expected graduation from high school (2003-2004) in order to understand what indicators would affect their projected graduation date. Unlike many of the early K-8 schools, the population Balfanz et al followed consisted of "64% African American, 19% White, 12% Hispanic, and 5% Asian students. Additionally, 97% of the sample attended schools that were majority minority" (2007, p. 227). Balfanz et al found that the four variables, or "flags," that had the highest predictive power and yield were: sixth grade attendance, failing math in sixth grade, failing English in sixth grade, and receiving an out-of-school suspension in sixth grade (2007). Second, the more flags that students had the lower their chances of graduating on time became. More specifically, one-flag, two-flag, three-flag and four-flag students had a 36%, 21%, 13%, and 7% chance of on time graduation, respectively (Balfanz et al, 2007). In debriefing of this study produced in 2010, Balfanz summarized the importance of his earlier findings: "during the middle grades, students in high-poverty environments are either launched on the path to high school graduation or knocked off-track" (Balfanz, 2010, p. 7).

Dear graduates, just between us, tell me: are you done with High School? Are you ready to move on to new endeavors? I thought so. Perhaps some of you were ready months ago, right? Or even some of you thought that you were already ready when I was your soccer coach in Middle School! I promise I won’t tell that to Mr. Johnson or Mrs. Heilman. / However, on the other hand, that is how life works. Our life is full of temporary things. You keep moving on to the thing as the years pass.

When did you decide your major in a university? Some people find their dreams when they’re kids, and for them this question is meaningless. I chose my major when I was in a senior year of high school. To tell the truth, in Japan, this is late. In Japan, students have to state a major when they apply for a university, and majors hold their own enrollment examinations. This means that high school students have to finish deciding their major while they are in high school. In order to be ready for this, teachers ask high school students their first, second and third choices of universities and majors right after starting their freshman, and then they will study for the enrollment examinations, which is the biggest purpose. What if students cannot decide these major yet? They probably choose well-known universities and interdisciplinary majors. However, most students are careless about how much the decisions mean to their lives. If they have specific plans or views of their lives, they can begin preparing for the next steps that mean they are able to be a few steps ahead of other students. More preparing has a lot of worth. Therefore, the best way to succeed in Japan is thinking about an educational decision early because of the better quality of study, the connection among majors, universities and jobs, and the correlation between majors and our personalities.