Mr. Chairman, Distinguished Guests, Parents, Friends and Fellow graduates
It is my honour and privilege to present the valedictory address for the graduating class of 1958.
The members of this class have thought of graduation as an event to happen in the dim, distant future. We are all taken aback by its presence upon us. It is hard to realize that we are the first students to enter grade 7 in this new school and graduate to the top. It seems only a short while ago that we were rampaging through the upper halls in the Junior High. Now we are being shown, the doors on an institution that belongs to each of us for the last times. During our stay here we have seen many changes in both our surroundings and ourselves. This beautiful auditorium which we are using this evening was not built until our second year here. At present we are seeing the first work being done on the construction of the new Junior High School directly to the south of this one. Our stay here has brought about more than just physical changes in our environment but also cultural changes in ourselves.
When we entered this new school in the fall of 1952 we looked upon our schooling as a pastime, and school as a place to go to keep warm and to keep occupied. Our teachers still complain that is what we are doing here at present. But through the courses taken by the students we soon began to go our separate ways and decide on our futures. We were given the opportunity to follow courses in many varied subjects, each to our own liking. With the learning we have acquired through our schooling we must now look to the future and go out into the community to embark on our next phase of life.
We are now at the end of our public schooling. We have progressed through twelve years of spoon feeding by our teachers, and we are at the commencement of a new way of life facing the cold hard, outside world where we will have to use our acquired knowledge to survive.
We now ask ourselves how has all this been made possible. Can we say that each of us has been responsible for the position he holds tonight or can we say our mothers and fathers are responsible or was it our teachers and counsellors? No, our position tonight is the result of a combination of the three. Our parents have provided us with the opportunity to obtain this education. It has been their daily problem to make us go to school and to try to prepare us for our day's work but all their struggles were in vain if we did not supply the initiative to accept the responsibility before us. Once we entered the school the responsibility rested with our teachers. It has been by their perseverance and patience that we are here tonight. Each and every one of us is deeply indebted to the men and women who have tried so diligently to impart some knowledge to us. All we can do in gratitude is to humbly thank both our teachers and our parents.
School to all of us as we look back has been a place of happiness. We have become young men and women proficient in such fields as music, sports and academic subjects. School has furnished us also with many long and lasting friendships. None of us will ever forget his school habits, no matter how trivial they may seem, even if it is only calling a person by a nick name. I have no doubts that if we all had the opportunity we would live our High School days over again. But since this is not possible we must look to the future and proceed upon our individual paths to the best of our abilities.
The phase that we are marking tonight may most aptly be concluded by a quotation of the famous statesman Sir Winston Churchill, "THIS IS NOT THE END, IT IS NOT EVEN THE BEGINNING OF THE END, BUT IT IS PERHAPS THE END OF THE BEGINNING."
