While Woodson High School’s administration announced the colleges that its graduates plan to attend in the fall, adding a feeling of pride and prestige to the graduation ceremony June 13, the class of 2007 was in a more lighthearted mood.
The students smuggled in inflatable animals to toss around during the ceremony. As administrators called out colleges like Harvard, Brown and Yale, students hit a monkey, whale, flamingo, sea horse and several beach balls into the air. The stunts got many laughs from the parents and guests in the stands, but faculty and administrators confiscated the playful toys at every chance. School was over, but the rules hadn’t stopped.
"We’re finally here," said Russell Gong, who gave a student welcome address and later won the school’s leadership award.
The class of about 470 listened to several student speakers speak about the journey that has been high school. From the earlier days of thinking that facial hair was a big deal, according to one student speaker, to driving cars and eventually sending off college applications, the journey seemed long. Each experience was different, and the individuals that the experiences brought about now prepare for the ultimate question, said George Miller, the student speaker who presented the "charge to the class." The question the 2007 graduates are asking themselves, as they wander past high school, said Miller, is "what are we going to do with ourselves?"
THE FEAR of the unknown; that’s what the students have on their minds, Miller said. He didn’t have a clue about what he’s going to do, but he recognized that hope is always present. He also recognized that not having all the answers isn’t necessarily a bad thing.
"Our parents managed to make it, and we’re smarter than they are," said Miller, who received a response of laughter. "Not all of those who wander are lost."
When faced with the unknown, take the optimistic route, said Anne Abernathy, an Olympic athlete and the Woodson commencement guest speaker.
"Why not?" asked Abernathy. "Remember those words; they’re magic, they’re absolute magic … you’ll not only change your own attitude, you’ll change the attitude of those around you."
Abernathy didn’t enter her first Olympic Games until she was in her early 30s. She faced coaches and colleagues who couldn’t believe someone her age was entering the luge competition at the Olympics. Since her first games, she’s been back five times. Fellow athletes and fans call her "Grandma Luge," and she’s living up to the name. Abernathy, 54, was the first woman to compete in six Olympic games, and she’s in the Guinness Book of World Records as the oldest woman to ever compete in the Olympic Games.
"When an opportunity came in front of me, I did not take a step back," she said. "Make your own history — why not?"
Woodson’s graduating class is "one body, 470 strong," said Gong, but the one body is made up of individuals. While the faculty and administration may have read out the names of colleges as if they were the end-all, be-all accomplishments in life, plenty of other graduates will go on to accomplish so much more than college, said Miller. The graduates would someday see their fellow classmates on TV, he said, or read about them in the newspapers. Some might travel the world, or explore space. In the end, Miller wanted his classmates to realize their responsibilities.
"Our responsibility is to the planet and humanity, not to a steady income," he said. "Let us wander toward glory."