I’ve imagined this day for as long as I can remember, from watching my cousins graduate across the country to seeing my close friends and my own brother walk across this very stage but I never imagined it would come this fast. I stand now and look out across at all of your faces and find it almost impossible to believe how far we’ve come and the amazing world we have built for ourselves here. It has been an honor to be able to change and grow along side each of you for the last four years, pushing eachother past our limits, learning to overcome together, and achieving higher goals than we ever might have dared to set alone. It would be impossible for me personally to explain how thankful I am to have been a part of something as special as this group. We’ve become elite in every sort of the word leaving our mark on everything we touch increasing its value exponentially. Aristotle once said with regards to a final product of much work and effort that “The whole is greater than the sum of its parts.” We as the Centaurus class of 2012 have become amazing individually but the total of all these smaller parts has become so much greater than just a sum, we’ve joined together to make a difference so many times and here we are, our final joint venture, to walk across this stage as one unit before we break apart and head on our separate paths.
We have spent at least the last four years getting up every morning trudging to school, rushing to the 630 am class, forgetting our locker combos, which class was next, if it was block day, our homework, about that big chem test today, staying late hours for practices and rehearsals only to go home and procrastinate late into the night just so we could do it all again the next day, but as each year came to a close we found ourselves wondering where all that time had gone. I think we can all agree that this year has gone the fastest, blame it on senioritis, your workload, or global climate change for all I care but what I find myself wanting right now is to be able to just press pause. It’s not that I am not excited for what lies ahead, I want to move forward into my life too, but I ask you all to look at the amazing people around you. These peers have shape you into the person you are today. Look over there at our teachers, the mentors who have been the hardest on us, pushing us to our fullest potential until we think we hate them but still standing by our sides when we need them most. Turn around and see your families and friends who have come out to support you camping out to get the perfect uncomfortable bleacher spot. This moment will never happen again. We will never again have all this support and love with these same people here in this same place. Now please take a moment and search yourself for that pride, we’ve all made it this far to this day of our graduation and that is something to be extremely proud of.
We are the closing members of generation Y, the Millennials, Generation Next, Net Generation, the Echo Boomers, defined by a new century, the world wide web, 90s culture, pop music, and Harry Potter. We are growing up in a world that changes and grows at a rate unconceivable not long ago but we’ve forced the rest of the world to adapt. As we go on in life we will continue to push the boundaries of what has been deemed possible into a whole new world of knowledge and opportunities. As we move forward we may always know that we have already been a part of something greater than ourselves and will surely do so again.
Rachel McClure
May 19th, 2012
