David Mccullough's Graduation Speech: The Value Of Education

Remember graduating from high school? Graduation day is the day when every high school senior is told they have to go out into the world and make something of himself or herself. It is also the day that parents throw extravagant soirees for their son or daughter. It almost seems to send the wrong message that high school was the completion of the good times, so go out with a bang, but the celebration is called a commencement. The meaning of commencement is an act or instance of commencing; beginning. It maybe the end high school, but it is the beginning of so much more. David McCullough Jr., English teacher at Wellesley High School and the son of a Pulitzer Prize-winning historian, said some pretty shocking things that you would not expect

In The Nicomachean Ethics the ancient Greek philosopher Aristotle says, “since the intellect is the highest thing in us, and the objects that apprehends are the highest things that can be known”. Learning is something that is essential to existence and we will never stop doing it. The best way to learn is through reading McCullough remarks on reading are to “read all the time read as a matter of principle, as a matter of self-respect. Read as a nourishing staple of life. Develop and protect a moral sensibility and demonstrate the character to apply it.” It is through reading we are able to enhance our vocabulary and become more knowledgeable. Reading gets us outside ourselves and helps us realize we never stop

Well according to pop-culture the past five years has been all about the phrase “YOLO” (acronym for, You Only Live Once). McCullough refutes this statement by explaining that there is an illegitimacy the expression “because you can and should live not merely once, but every day of your life. Rather than You Only Live Once, it should be You Live Only Once.” It is pretty crazy how different those expressions are just by switching the words “only” and “live”. We have one life and if we do not want to be the ones to hold ourselves back by not allowing ourselves to tap our full potential. “Climb the mountain not to plant your flag, but to embrace the challenge, enjoy the air and behold the view. Climb it so you can see the world, not so the world can see you. Go to Paris to be in Paris, not to cross it off your list and congratulate yourself for being worldly.” If we seek to simply do things for the sake of getting something for ourselves we have the wrong idea. The message that McCullough is trying to send to the group of graduates is that one does not have to do something to gain something for himself or herself. Rather, he or she should do something so as to receive something else back. If we become more receptive we will gain more experience which will help us become whole-hearted and well-rounded