Penncrest Valedictorian, Salutatorian Speeches

Valedictorian Anderson Beck will attend Penn State Main Campus and study engineering in the fall. Salutatorian Rachel Hosier will attend University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign in the fall on a scholarship she earned through Science Olympiad. Check out the speeches from top graduates. 

Valedictorian Anderson Beck's Speech

Good Evening Class of 2011.

We have a lot of things about Penncrest that we can remember: 

• Some of us remember the football games.
• Some of us remember the music concerts.
• Some of us remember the JV show.
• Some of us remember Relay for Life.
• Some of us remember the proms.
• Some of us remember all of these things.
• Some of us remember only a few.

But regardless of what we remember of our experience, we have memories of our time here.

It doesn't matter what our individual strengths are. Each of us has some thing.

Our opportunities are in front of us.

Life after high school has a lot more freedom -- freedom to venture out, freedom to explore.

At Penncrest we had to fit ourselves into seven periods a day, five days a week. But there’s a lot more to our future. Outside Penncrest we can all do something that counts for us. We can all find that special strength.

All of us have already accomplished something worth counting:

• For some of us, that's athletics.
• For some of us, that's academics.
• For some of us, that's art, theater, or music.
• For some of us, that's our service to the community.
• For some of us, that's some thing that doesn't have anything to do with Penncrest.

But it still matters.

It’s ours -- our contribution.

Penncrest has been something special to us, maybe just a small something. But however we put together our experience at Penncrest, we all made it. We are all here together. We all contributed some thing to these four years.

Cherish your time at Penncrest in your heart as you leave it behind to start something new and bold.

We had four years to make a difference. Now we have the rest of our lives to make an even bigger difference.

Congratulations Class of 2011!

Salutatorian Rachel Hosier's Speech

Good evening class of 2011! We’ve been waiting for this night for the last four years, and I congratulate you all for making it here tonight. 

I’d also like to thank the administrators, teachers, friends, and family who have been there for us throughout our high school careers and are here to support us tonight.

Welcome everyone, and thank you for being here.

Tonight -- we are graduating from high school. This is truly a monumental occasion. After tonight, we are done.

No more WebAssign, no more PSSAs or SATs, no more waiting at the bus stop in the freezing cold and pouring rain.

The last twelve years of our lives have been leading up to this night, and with some help along the way -- we made it.

For many of us, this night is bittersweet. One one hand, we’re moving on to bigger and better things, whether we’re going to college, entering the work force, traveling abroad, or joining the armed forces. But on the other hand, we’re leaving behind many of the people we have come t0 depend on over the last four years.

For some of us, tonight might be the last time we ever see each other. For others, that moment might come later this summer. A lucky few of us may still stay close to our friends, geographically speaking.

Though there are many close groups of friends in this class, we are really a divers group of people gathered here tonight.

Some of us are involved in theater, some in music, some in community service efforts, some in academic teams, many in athletics.

Our paths might not have crossed very often over the last four years, but we will always have this in common -- this night, these diplomas, this experience.

No matter what you do or where you go, you will always be a member of the Penncrest High School Class of 2011.

Each and every one of us had to work hard to get here tonight, but we had a lot of help along the way.

We need to thank our teachers, without whom this entire night would not be possible. They all instruct us and they all test us, but we all know they do so much more than that.

They stay after school to help us if we don’t understand something. They help run our many extracurricular activities. They care about us if we’re having a bad day, and they genuinely want us to succeed.

We also need to thank our parents. They have supported us not only through our high school careers, but throughout our entire lives.

They’ve shared our pain when we’ve had late nights working on homework, or when we’ve had to stay home sick. They’ve shared our success when we get a good grade on a test or win a football game. They’ve always been there for us, and even though many of us are moving out and moving along with our lives, they’ll still be there for us.

We should also thank the upperclassmen who have come before us, the underclassmen who will come after us, and the many members of the community who are involved with the school. Together, they form the family that supports us and lifts us up.

Finally, I’d like to thank all of you.

Over the past four years, and some even longer, you’ve been a hand to hold, a shoulder to lean on, a moan to commiserate with, and a smile to share a joke with.

It is the people in this class that have made the last four years awesome, and I a genuinely proud to be a member of the class of 2011.

I would like to congratulate all of you on your accomplishments. You are all awesome, unique, and talented individuals, and I am proud to say I know you. I wish you luck in all of your future endeavors. These last four years have been great, but I know that for all of you, the best is yet to come.

Thank you.

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More Graduation Coverage: Check out this photo gallery taken of loved ones at the graduation Thursday night. Also, check out the  and a . Read the and check out the . Check out this . Don't forget to , too.