Graduation Speech: I Am Racist

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Fellow graduates, faculty, administration, family and friends, there past weeks we have had time to reflect and cherish moments that make the memories of our time as a young adult. Many of you are overjoyed and excited for future plans. Some of you are even thrilled just to leave high school and get far away as possible. I don’t know how much advice I can give you guys because let's face it, none of us know anything about the real world and becoming successful. I can give you a mindful recommendation to “step out of your shell”, “dream big,” “we are the leaders of tomorrow,” or “this isn’t the end, it’s the beginning,” but what does any of that jargon really mean? Does any of it really matter? On thing you will come across in your future are labels. Society loves putting labels on …show more content…

Republican vs. Democrat, Illegal immigrant, addict, homosexual, poor, rich, and even white or black are all common labels that separate the population. I will tell you a comical story about my time at Canterbury. My freshman year was one of the hardest years for me because I couldn’t get used to the high school landscape and all that follows. My grades suffered tremendously and I labeled myself stupid or deficient. I compared myself to the masses which made me believe that I couldn’t handle Canterbury. The next year I saw improvement but it still wasn’t enough. I decided to take some harder classes junior year so my grades didn’t improve outstandingly. Senior year was the turning point. Finally I could manage school and understand what was happening in the classroom. I couldn’t tell you what was different about senior year, but something clicked in my brain. I improved one full GPA average. I had never experienced such a contrast in my academics but I kept moving forward no matter what label had already been established about me. The labels that society forces on you do not define you, only you can prove the labels

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