Speeches / Speech about Education - For graduation (education, life experience, learning) [2]

Hi everyone,

Our school allows 3 people to give speeches at graduation. Two get it because they are valedictorian and president. The third has to enter a competition to get the slot. Here is my speech. It focuses on the importance of education, life experience, and the ability to learn.

Thank you for the help

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Graduation Speech Revision 1

Good evening Ms Magee, (other dignitaries), parents, friends, and fellow classmates.
Thank you for giving me this opportunity to speak to you. My name is Jonathan Abboud. I'm grateful to have served as the Student Union president this year. This fall, I will be attending the University of California at Santa Barbara.

Four years and seven days ago many of my fellow classmates and I were graduating from eighth grade two miles down the street. We looked forward to high school as the next best experience in our lives. Although I haven't been a part of this community for as long as some here, I'll try to share with you some of my own thoughts and some of our common concerns.

Most, if not all of us, wondered at various times during these past four years: "what's the point of high school" or "why do I need to know this," when being taught concepts and lessons that seemed unneeded to us at the moment. There is an answer to both of these questions; simply put, education is the cure for ignorance. More to the point, there are three parts to the education you receive in high school, in college, or in life. I will explain more about that later.

One of my favorite quotes is by Robert A. Heinlein, "A human being should be able to change a diaper, plan an invasion, butcher a hog, conn a ship, design a building, write a sonnet, balance accounts, build a wall, set a bone, comfort the dying, take orders, give orders, cooperate, act alone, solve equations, analyze a new problem, pitch manure, program a computer, cook a tasty meal, fight efficiently, die gallantly. Specialization is for insects."

We shouldn't sit idle, learning nothing at all, learning mostly empty information, or learning only about a subject or two that interests us. The latter is what many perceive the point of college to be, which is false. A citizenry who limits itself to a narrow field of information better prepare for a grim world.

We don't want a world where people will learn only about the arts or sciences; yet remain ignorant of economics, simply because it doesn't appeal to them. Such people will fall victim to believing irrational ideas presented by those wanting to take advantage of their ignorance.

We don't want a world filled with people who won't concern themselves with anything outside of personal interests. Because then they can become the ignorant electorate with the power to change their country with their votes, while possibly not choosing anything that will result in meaningful change, or worse, will result in further decline or greater problems.

We don't want a world that nobody wants to live in because it is no longer safe nor free. A citizenry that enriches itself with a varied education is invulnerable to tyranny.

However, academic education is only a fraction of a person's total education. Life after academia gives people experience in situations no school can ever teach. Oscar Wilde said "Education is an admirable thing, but it is well to remember from time to time that nothing that is worth knowing can be taught."

What we may learn in a government or political science class cannot compare to the experience of working with a local, state, or national official - either as an office employee or campaign worker.

Any cultural studies class will not enlighten us the way visiting and living in the studied foreign location will.

Learning accounting methods will not give you the "kitchen table economics" knowledge that a single parent learns while trying to balance the family's budget. (Which, by the way, a single parent should not have to do on a mediocre wage and inadequate child support.)

Our formal education lasts for about 17 years, our informal one lasts the rest of our lives. While we must embrace a formal education, we must not underestimate what we can learn while living our lives. We should embrace new experiences that will further our outlook on life. Our unique experiences are the lessons we will pass on to the next generation, not the lessons learned in the classroom. Many people, in the pursuit of more and more academic education have to pay the opportunity cost of sacrificing some years of rich life experiences. Those who can experience the two, come out the best.

Now, receiving both kinds of education is critical, but how do we do it? What do we need? We need the ability to know how to learn. That's it, the holy grail of existence. It's not enough to take great notes and ace a test. It's not enough to successfully overcome a hardship in life. One must be able to take the information, comprehend what happened, analyze its meaning, and synthesize to give it meaning. If we are not able to learn, we can never progress as individuals. You cannot find a book anywhere on our planet which will teach you how to learn. The process of learning to effectively learn is completely derived from receiving an education. That is the point of school. That is the point of a difficult and boring math class. A harmless method to gain the ability to learn. What a novel process. It's like building muscle; at first you have very little, but as you break it down by lifting weights (the equivalent to taking in new material), it will recover better than before. Someone who can effectively learn, from anywhere or anything, is the model citizen. They may make mistakes, they may lose from time to time, but they will never fail in life.

Those of you going off to college don't groan about the required general education courses. The education you receive, in a wide range of topics, will help you more than any piece of paper with words "Bachelor of Arts."

With your degree, hopefully you feel a civic duty to impart your knowledge on others and actively organize for a better World. Even those of you not attending college and for those finished with college, education is now unlimited and almost free, and you also have a whole life full of experience. President Obama said in his commencement address to the University of Michigan "We are the ones we've been waiting for. We are the change that we seek."

I challenge everyone here today, parents, teachers, and students. Go out into the world, use what you know, acquire more knowledge, and make something happen. Anybody who does nothing to alleviate their situation has no right to complain to about it. Drop your idleness and over consumption of useless information, you know gossip about celebrities and the like. Fight for something you believe in. Become like President Obama says the change you seek.

Thank you everyone for coming, showing your support these last 18 years, and for just being there for us.

A special thank you to my family, my closest friends who are here today and the ones who couldn't be, to my teachers over the years, and to everyone I've learned a nugget of information from. I promise that I will not disappoint you.

Speeches / Student Government Speech [4]

I'd like to apologize about the weather, I promise you elect me I'll try to do something about that.

Or

Hello Students and Teachers of Culver City,

I'd like to welcome you all today, a day of momentous importance, to give a final address to the Student Body as candidate for the office of President. This is not a position to be taken lightly and definitely one not to be wasted or abused.

I came to this school only knowing one person. I'll admit, I didn't have many friends my first few months here. I had come from a tiny private school and had to adjust to this grand institution. However, that fourteen year old boy from St. Augustine is not the same man who stands before you today, asking for your vote. Today, I an aspiring leader of the Associated Student Body.

Many of you are just regular students. You never get involved in school spirit events or any activities of the like. It'd be interesting to know that until this campaign started, I was the same as you, never joining any class council or a related group. I wholeheartedly understand every reason you have not to care and with that understanding I know exactly how to get all of you involved in our school. It does seem intimidating to go up to ASB or the Administration to propose an idea or make known a complaint or grievance, I will not argue that. However, I will make it my main goal to end this perception of ASB. Under me, the lines between ASB and the general population will be blurred; therefore I will create a more personal community and government within our school. Any student will be able to contribute as they please.

CCHS sits in the center of Los Angeles, but we have no direct ties to any schools in the area, let alone the city. We must be vigilant and work towards building these ties, which we will work to construct with my Documents of Los Angeles Unity

No longer will the ideas of creative students be ignored

No longer will the complaints and grievances of students be brushed aside

No longer will we remain an isolated community, but become a leader to the schools around us.

No longer will ASB be a separate clique from the students and it WILL become the Vox Populi, the voice of the people.

Culver Rises!
Culver Prevails!
Culver Renews!

Writing Feedback / Private Eloquence/ PAST EXPERIENCE [3]

I would like a second opinion for my essay in terms of grammar and fully answering the question, of course I am not the person to do so.

Q. Select a past experience that has played an important role in making you who you are and explain what the experience was and why it was so important. This essay will demonstrate your mastery of stylistic techniques, i.e. voice diction, concrete details, syntax, and complex sentence structure.

Private Pre-Eminence?
Despicable, low life, and disruptive are all adjectives used by the private Catholic schools to described the public school system. I attended a private school, St. Augustine School (SAS), for the first nine years of my education and like all other private school students came to decide my high school of choice during the eighth grade. While under extreme pressure and scrutiny to choose a certain highly esteemed private school I chose to attend Culver City High School under a permit for its film. While I did not know it and resented the idea at the time, attending CCHS was the single most important event in my entire life.

During my time in private school I was a very naďve person. I saw the world in terms of my school and its small size. SAS and its high school counterpart's size were under four hundred, therefore there was no chance to meet new people or gain social skills. In private school I was taught that there is nothing different in the world and as a child I accepted that as fact. This contributed to my first few months at CCHS which were plagued with regret and anger over choosing a public school.

However, my mind and opinions have changed about both forms of school and so have my views on a myriad of subjects such as evolution and political leaning. When I was a freshman I was under the impression that public school students were inherently "bad." This coupled with my inadequate (and for a time unnecessary) skills in meeting new people gave me an immediate bad impression of CCHS. My eyes were still clouded by the falsities about my previous school including fraternity with classmates, the quality of the teaching, and the innumerate good times. As time moved forward and I entered my sophomore year I came to accept many of these supposed facts as half truths, but still respected SAS over CCHS. An interesting development, however, is the fact that I learned that wallowing in the past, for any reason, will not nourish progress.

While the major event that changed my life did take place while I was fourteen years old and an incoming freshman I did not realize it until the dawn of my junior year. By the start of eleventh grade I had established myself in high school. I knew many people, had extraordinary teachers*, and found a niche for myself in journalism. As a result the veil over my perception of public and private schools was lifted. No longer did I have a reason to resent CCHS and this allowed me to view both schools objectively. I was even led to discovering the numerous historical inaccuracies I was taught at SAS. This allowed me to understand that I should not take everything I learn as concrete fact and encouraged me to thoroughly research and acquire answers on my own.

The state I am in today would not be attainable without having attended CCHS. I was transformed to be much more social, think more, and am actually eager to begin school each morning. I am now interested in science and politics, subjects fundamental to an understanding of today's world and both suppressed in private school. I have shed the enormous amount of prejudice private upbringings indulge.

Thank you in advance, this has a 500 word limit so I think it may feel rushed in a few sentences.