Culmination Address for the Class of 2019

Each year I write an original oratory hoping my students will take the form and write speeches of their own. Some years the process is a struggle, but when I sat down to write this speech, I knew exactly what I would remember about this year. I will miss this group of students so much. Remember, y'all, everyday is Newday. And to all of the students, teachers, and families who lived through the strike of 2019, congrats! We made it!

Stand Up

It was raining in Los Angeles. Not just a misting, like we often get in May Gray and June Gloom. No, it was pouring down rain, and it wasn’t just for a day. For a whole week, it was torrential. Roads washed out. Canyons cut loose with mud and debris. Shoes and clothes drenched in the time it takes to walk from the car to the house. This past January, it really rained in LA.

photo by Sophie Sanchez

Maybe you remember this rain. Or maybe you remember something else. Maybe you remember swollen crowds of red flooding into the streets, or driving past school after school where educators stood in red raincoats and beneath umbrellas, holding signs, chanting, and even dancing. Or maybe you just remember being home, or at school, where in addition to the rain, things were not as they usually are.

This year, we all went on strike. We prepared for the strike, went on strike, and recovered from the strike together. It wasn’t just the teachers union, it was all of us. In pouring down rain, for more than a week we all were on strike. We stood up for our schools and our city and the students and families in it.

In the days before the strike, many of you asked, “When are we going on strike?” And during the strike many of you stood in support by staying home, or passing out high-fives on the picket line, or by joining us and saying, “We support our teachers; we deserve better.”

When resolution came and victories for our schools were won, we all came back. We got back to work in our crowded classrooms. We worked because what else can you do while you wait to see smaller classes, nurses everyday, and libraries staffed with teacher librarians? You keep working.

But I’m not here to tell you work hard. You’ve finished your days at Emerson, so you know something about hard work. You already know that, as Ralph Waldo Emerson says, “Without work one finishes nothing.” And after the strike, you came back to class and read To Kill A Mockingbird. We discussed all the ways we can stand up in the world and do what we believe is right, even if it is unpopular. That is what I hope you will take with you to high school.

Emerson's line stays strong!

For a few rainy days in January, we had the chance to stand up for our schools, but opportunities like this don’t come around every day. The next time you can, will you stand up for what you believe?

Atticus Finch says, “Courage is when you know you're licked before you begin, but you begin anyway and see it through no matter what.”

The world will need you to stand up against prejudice and pollution, for refugees and respect, and in a millions ways we cannot even imagine. But I believe in you, Class of 2019, and I hope when the world asks who are you? What do you believe? You will have the courage to stand up and tell the world your truth.