VERO BEACH — It was standing room only at the Citrus Bowl Friday evening as more than 600 senior students in red and white caps and gowns entered their home field for the final time as high school students.
“With a simple turn of a tassel today, your high school career will move from your present to your past,” said Vero Beach High School Principal Shawn O’Keefe.
Among Vero Beach High School’s Class of 2014 graduates stood four National Merit finalists, 104 Advanced Placement graduates, 195 Honors graduates, five students with Associate Degrees, more with college credits built up, many with technical training and certificates, and a large number with exceptional accolades in arts and athletics.
All of those students, no matter how they arrived at high school graduation or where they will go now that their primary education has come to an end, celebrated the iconic moment in their lives together on graduation night.
“With the right mindset, we truly can achieve greatness,” said Jacqueline Holland, the class Valedictorian who addressed her class from the podium. “It is not our failures or struggles that define who we are.”
Holland congratulated her classmates on reaching the academic milestone they had all arrived at together. Graduation, she said, was proof enough that each student has the ability to overcome challenges.
“A wise man once told me, 10 percent of life happens to you, the other 90 percent is what you do with it,” Holland said, quoting her grandfather who recently passed away after a battle with cancer.
She urged her class to remember the family members, friends, teachers, and role models who sometimes believed in their students more than the students believed in themselves, and to strive to develop into role models for generations to come.
As Holland continues her education at the University of Texas in the fall, the class Salutatorian, Giordano Bordoli will head off to Duke University.
Bordoli addressed the departing class, stressing the importance of experiencing life to the fullest. He encouraged his classmates not to attack the future just through a textbook, but to travel, challenge themselves, and try new things.
Repeating a phrase that his brother used in his own Salutatorian speech only a few years prior, Bordoli said, “Don’t be afraid that your life will end, be afraid that it will never begin.”
According to both Holland and Bordoli, the Senior Class had already experienced much together, and now that they will all go separate ways and take on new challenges, their memories will be important to hold on to.
As the Vero Beach High School class motto states, “In Growing, we have Friendship. In Learning, we have Shared Knowledge. In Pride we have Left Memories.”
Now that each of the high school seniors have officially crossed the threshold from creating high school experiences to remembering them, the thread that will always hold them together will be the “2014” stamped on their hard earned, Vero Beach high school diploma.
