The culmination of a dozen years of formal education is at hand - a just cause for celebration! You have fulfilled a quantifiable set of requirements, but what did you really learn? You have demonstrated your ability to cope with deadlines, social stress, challenging situations, major life changes, and even smelly gym socks.
Knowledge is the progeny of struggle. Every challenge and adverse situation you've endured has served to strengthen your adaptability and taught you valuable lessons.
All of the events that have been shared with friends, educators and parents in the past four years are experiences that have been infused into each individual's sense of self and will continue to influence your future.
You have reached the end of an era, yet that era will remain forever with you. As you venture out, hopefully instilled with the knowledge you have gained, the future will abound with new and challenging opportunities. As you begin a new stage of life, (and the beginning of the end of your life), I want to tell you something someone once told me: "You know, life is like a possum in a trash can." That was a new one on me!
"Yeah," I said. "How?"
"Well, if the possum just sits in the can, it'll scrounge on the tidbits on top. But if the can gets shaken and rolled around a bit, the possum can get to the really good slop at the bottom."
At first it just sounded like one of those "You might be redneck if ..." cartoons, but then I realized that there was a pertinent message underlying the seemingly mundane adage. Don't be contented with the bare minimum - what's given to you, what's comfortable, what's familiar, what's easy - that's just grazing the top. Shake the can! You can be like that lazy possum and nibble on the discarded pudding wrappers, soggy Cheetos and wood shavings of yesterday. Or, you can seize the moment and rattle the can around to get at the licorice, fudge, chocolate truffle ice cream and half-eaten cheesecake of last week. The world holds much more to be experienced than it easily and readily delivers.
Often times, school and social pressure condition us to think and act certain ways. Throughout our daily routines young people are pressured by society to think and act certain ways, to settle neatly into a niche that feels comfortable. Over time, we become accustomed to conforming to preconceived notions of what is expected and "normal.
No amount of education can completely prepare us for the world that lies ahead of us. Because it presents many unknowns, it is exciting yet at the same time frightening. I know that there are still so many things that can only be learned through experience; a challenge with which we will soon all be faced. I would like to read a letter written by a woman by the name of Avril Johannes which was published in the book "Chicken Soup For the Soul." She writes this letter to the world upon her son's and his classmates' graduation and it relates some of these same ideas.
South African Archbishop Desmond Tutu wrote, "You are a very special person - become what you are." These words encourage us, the graduating class of 2012, to recognize the goodness and potential in each and every one of us and to go out and excel in the world. We are a diverse group of different aspirations and backgrounds, bound for different corners of the earth to carve out our won individual niches. Before we leave behind Lee Falls High School and each other, we must ask ourselves how we have become who we are.
Our knowledge is a key to our success and happiness in our life to give us personal satisfaction. Knowledge is power but not always. Sometimes our self-awareness and growth as an individual gives us negative thoughts that make us want to go back to undo it. Everyone wants to unlearn a part in our life that brought us pain and problems. Good or bad experiences brought by true wisdom can be used for our self-acceptance, self-fulfillment and these experiences would make us stronger as we walk to the road of our so called “life”, but Douglas’s and my experience about knowledge confirmed his belief that “Knowledge is a curse”. Both of us felt frustrated and sad from learning knowledge.
I have gained experience in planning for, and working towards, career and life goals most specifically through completing this transitions package and the Career Transitions course. I had never given much thought to my future, as I always thought it was always so far away, however June keeps drawing closer and closer. The course and this package forced me to seriously put in the time and effort to think about my future, and where I want to be in the future. I have learnt what my priorities are and what I want from my life, in terms of personal, social, intellectual, and career
First, in attempt to take the advice to include a symbolic quote, it became quite clear that no matter what, life is an endless stream of contradictions and inconsistencies. You see, they tell us that “haste makes waste,” but then, “the early bird gets the worm.” And “don’t put off until tomorrow what you can get done today,” but we’re supposed to “stop and smell the roses”? When do we have time to smell the roses when we’re busy doing everything today? And how do you “shoot for the moon” when you are being told to “wish upon a star”?
Over the past year or so some dreadful events have occurred at high schools, alarming the American public while they have talked about increased security, clinging to images of guns, blood and typical-looking teenagers committing unthinkable crimes. The media has focused on these incidents without giving attention to all of the potential and talent that is flourishing throughout our high schools. I invite them to recognize the inspired pupils who are propelling themselves beyond standard and motivating others around them. That is what I want the American public to be talking about.
Betty Lou is right -- Our achievements of the past four years have been an honor. And so I offer my congratulations to each of you for achieving the honor that comes with high school graduation. Up to this point, high school may be the most exciting and difficult experience of our lives. We've enjoyed the carefree and happy times with WWF-style pep assemblies, dances, Junior T-P nights, and classes with friends. We've had our bad days too, though. The days when we forgot our semester project for C.I. at home, or when we couldn't stop falling asleep and Mr. Gnome made us get up to "open a window." But far worse were the times when we felt alone. We've all had days of personal crisis when we've felt rejected by those around us or alienated from them. Hopefully, we were fortunate enough to have had a friend come rescue us from isolation, but perhaps not.
Commencement is a critical juncture in our lives; it is a momentous occasion where we believe we are about to start anew. However, graduation is the bittersweet moment where the forces of past and future are simultaneously acting on us. Consequently, the past is not dead. Alfred, Lord Tennyson, suggests that our past experiences will be with us forever as he states, " [we] are a part of all that [we] have met; yet all experience is an arch where through gleams that untraveled world." That is why graduation, similar to other turning points in our lives, possesses two halves, which accentuate each other. We are looking forward, but the "arch" of experience beckons us to remember, value, and learn from our past experiences. Thus, I feel that in order to appreciate commencement fully, we must remember our own past, and in particular, the last four years:
Welcome to all of you who have come to share this special evening with us. My name is John and I am a member of the graduating class of 2012. Standing here tonight is a surprise to me and to many who knew me. At one point, after making some mistakes and losing my sense of self, I dropped out of school. With my parents’ urging me, I enrolled at Alternative High School. I came to this school with the hope that I’d graduate on time. I knew that I would have to change, so I set goals to achieve perfection and I achieved it. As many of you may know, I am now perfect in every way, shape, and form...
At times it may have been extremely difficult for some of us to predict where we would be today, but now we can embark upon our goals and congratulate ourselves for always striving to conquer our missions. No longer do we need to reminisce about what we were unable to accomplish - for we have accomplished the first step in our education.
Throughout these last four years we have grown so tightly together that we have become one single identity -- the graduating class ...
O’Shea, Joseph. “Delaying the Academy: A Gap Year Education.” Teaching in Higher Education 16.5 (2011). 565-577. Web. 16 March 2014.
One thing that is certain is that I will learn. Class after class, I will leave knowing more than I did when I entered. But outside of class, I will spend hours on the infamously quiet top floor of the Reynolds’ library honing what I have learned. Knowledge spawns such magnificent things and best of all it can’t be taken away. I could be beaten and bruised, breaths away from the face of death, but I still have my knowledge. However, knowledge can also be given, passed on to other people to possess for eternity. It is a gift....
Despite the benefits of PI, there continues to be a problem in determining which (PI) methods works best for student achievement in Title I middle schools. Anderson and Keith, 1997; Jodl, Michael, Malanchuk, Eccles, and Sameroff, 2001 cited in McLoyd, Hill, and Dodge (2005), suggest that “decreased parental school involvement in middle school may be due to the adolescent’s desire for autonomy and independence” (p. 236). Bhargava and Witherspoon (2015) further believe that when youth independence increases along with failing grades, parental involvement in education is vital.
Throughout my transient life, I have come across plenty of obstacles to the point where I believed the world despised me and was out to destroy my spirit. While in reality within every barrier was a surreptitious life lesson that could only be seen only through further scrutinization. In the end, the adversity of life is what makes life aesthetic because one cannot appreciate things going good if they never went bad. I believe the most important lesson life ever taught me was to live in the moment because things happen for a reason, so have fun, and make new experiences. I want to make the most out of life, I don’t want to be one of those old people who looks back at the days when they were young and have exasperation because of the chances that weren’t taken. I