While the scene outside the auditorium was dismal with a plunging stock market, bankrupt industries, and soaring unemployment rates, inside sat 98 graduates glowing bright with the hope that tomorrow will bring.
Michelle Obama delivered the keynote speech at the Washington Mathematics Science Technology Public Charter High School (WMST) graduation in Cramton Auditorium on Wednesday.
Obama’s presence at the ceremony was because of a letter written by student Jasmine Williams . The letter caused Obama to choose WMST as one of only two schools she will speak at this year.
“We will become adults, who will be faced with some of the hardest challenges since 1932. We will be put to the test to see if we can withstand the challenges of today’s world. This test has no guidelines or study guides on how to pass,” stated Williams’ letter.
“We will have to rely on common sense given to us by our families, the toughness we learned growing up in the conditions we did, and ‘that timeless creeds that sums up the spirit of a people: Yes We Can.’”
Growing up in the South Side of Chicago, Obama understands the difficulties that the students before her faced. She told the graduating class that she was proud to speak before a DC public school that strives to challenge the negative stereotypes and prove we, African-Americans and Latinos, can achieve.
WMST student Devon Dunn, who will attend the College of Notre Dame, describes those stereotypes as “jail or drugs.”
She said, “We are going out in the world and we do not know what’s going to happen.”
According to Obama, what will happen to those 98 students is that they will succeed. She told the class that anything can be achieved if they set their mind to it. She said that this is only their beginning.
WSMT Senior class president, Roderick Bradford, said, “We stand here because we are intelligent... capable and able to succeed.”
To the parents in the audience, Obama said while her parents did not go to college and everyone around her said she would fail, they gave her their unconditional love.
Obama said that there were “voices of people sewing doubt in my head... There was a part of me that began to doubt what I knew about me, my own truths.”
She said that she did not need her parents to tell her what to expect or prepare her with stories because it did not matter.
Whenever she began to doubt herself, it was her parents that told her that “no matter what the nagging voices said,” she deserved her accomplishments.
To the graduating seniors, Obama said they have to remember that they are not traveling this journey alone.
Class salutatorian, Rosmer Portillo, shared with his classmates and the audience that his father told him that Portillo was smart because he carried his father’s name.
“Then there are people like President Barack Obama, who was taught at a young age that anything is possible,” Obama said. “We all have doubts and nagging voices. In the end, we were all more than ready.”
She assured them that they are not alone in their fears. She said to ignore anyone that says they cannot.
“No excuses. Your future, today, is in your own hands. Own your voice, own it,” Obama said. “Your story, your experience has value and if you struggle, so what... Remember this day.”
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