Be Hatched

Here is the transcript of my address for graduation on May 23, 2020, which was a hybrid celebration: in-person, personal graduations combined in a video along with other awards and congratulations. Link to the video follows. Good afternoon. It is my pleasure to address the Class of 2020 at your high school commencement. During this time apart, you’ve been inundated with advice and quotes and memes and slogans. Some poignant and some funny but I found none more fitting than this one. One of my favorite authors, and certainly one of the most quoted, CS Lewis, wrote, “What you see and what you hear depends a great deal on where you are standing. It also depends on what sort of person you are.” Think about this. What you see and what you hear depends a great deal on where you are standing. This could be where you physically are, but more importantly, your role at the time. We call this empathy, or putting yourself in someone else’s shoes. This virus, this quarantine, has been inc...

We delivered gift bags to the seniors. In the bag was their cap and gown, alumni sticker, gift from their House parent, a homemade cookie from Sra Santiago, and a letter from teachers and staff to each student. I would like to share mine. To the Class of 2020: Once upon a time, I was a student-teacher. As my time in that classroom was ending (after only a semester of school), I asked the cooperating teacher I was with, “how do you let them go? You are with these kids everyday, don’t you miss them?” She laughed, having 30 years experience, and said, “it gets easier.” It does get easier to say goodbye. Especially after the final nine weeks. If we were still in school, you would be DONE. Done, done, done. You would have either thought or said aloud something to the effect, “It doesn’t matter. I am going to graduate even if I don’t get this done.” You would have chanced singing the real lyrics at prom, hoping those old uncool chaperones didn’t know the real words and coul...