A Four Faced Message to our Graduates

Friday, 01 April 2011 05:15

Written by Aaron Benedict De Leon

(This article is intended for our graduates who poured their best effort to finish 14 years of schooling.)

I’m sure that most of our students have either received their diploma or are on their way towards graduation. Nevertheless, as a youth leader, I have an important message to deliver for you, proud graduates of Batch 2010-2011.

This note/speech/article will be different, and will be more inclusive to all interests, because it touches the core of our individualities – being students, educators, parents, families, members of society and citizens of this country.

There is truth in what we call the Johari Window, because there are multiple faces to each person, thing or event in life. And today, we examine the complex communication and relationship that exist between actors and circumstances that make your graduation today a possibility and a creation of a future one.

This article will take on four personalities. The first of course, is of a congratulatory tone, to recognize and acknowledge everyone, may you be the Suma Cum Laude of your batch, or may you be the last student on the bus to graduation. This is a feat that you should take pride in, and that you should be proud of.

This is not just a victory of your academic achievement, but more so, a celebration of your resistance to societal pressures. The battle in education just does not teach you concepts and theories, but it also engages you to pass the correct requirements, to produce the best output, and to exhibit your natural talents and abilities. The wars toward educational attainment are not just confined in school, but the struggles are greater outside of it, when there is less or no supervision from anyone.

It is when you take personal responsibility in times where your families and education set you free, when you start to mingle with the society around you. It is in those moments where your character is defined and your mettle is tested.

There is the pressure of living the life of a youngster – the life of party-drinking, clubbing, meeting strangers; the life of firsts – your first crush, your first boyfriend, your first love; and the life of experiments – going places you’ve never been, exploring new trips and adventures, and the temptation of taking a bite of the forbidden apple.

It is when you are able to manage and temper your excitement and desire to taste life, and when you are able to use it as an experience without detriment to your moral fiber. It is when you are able to resist the evils which may destroy your future, and make reasonable and swift judgments when confronted with uncomfortable situations.
This is your period of maturation, and today, you have reached the penultimate stage of adolescence.

So to those who may not have been achievers in the academic sphere, please do not worry. Your parents are equally proud of the distinct and unique skills and abilities you were able to nurture in school – whether its art, crafts, sports or anything that has to do with recreation. They may not have realized the value of it all the time, but I’m sure, at this moment, they have forgiven you and they have accepted that these things make part of your life, of your student life, complete.

As much as congratulations are in order, this is a moment as well to share this victory with an important facet of your life, and with that comes the second personality of the speech, which takes on a never-ending gratitude face, expressing gratitude to the parents or guardians who granted you this opportunity to achieve this rare feat. We will not do this because we are complied or obliged to do so, but because we love them and we care for them so much.

Despite much economic pressure, they were able to send you to school and provide for the needs that came along with it. I’m not going to be very emotional about this, yet facts can even make you more tearful. Contrary to popular belief, sending your children to school is not a matter of obligation, but a matter of love. It is love that enables and ennobles the life of a parent, thus, the measure of his/her success does not lie in the money he/she gains in his endeavors, but it is when he/she is able to send his/her son/daughter to school and helps fulfill the dreams of his/her children. The life of a parent/guardian will not be complete, or his fulfilment will not be reached, without that diploma you are holding in your very hands.

And with the positives that go with graduation comes another task even greater than the one we overcame. The third personality is the responsibility face, a responsibility and an obligation to one’s hardwork and to the parents’ diligent efforts to make it possible. Graduation is only the beginning of a long and winding road, and it is the elementary phase of life. Once you go out of school, you are now on your own.

You now have the responsibility to represent yourself, to lobby yourself, to package yourself to people. Whether you so decide to be an entrepreneur or company employed, you have no other resort but to lean on what you’ve gained throughout that 14 year process. This is now that moment of liberty and freedom you sought for, and this is the price of that demand.

There are no books that teach street smarts, there is no manual which helps you get an automatic nod from an employer. You will have to depend on your natural skill and ability, which hopefully, you have honed and molded in school.

You will personally experience long lines in getting government issued permits for work, lining up just to have an interview spot, go back and forth from north to south, from an interview to another, from good news to bad news, and these are the realities of the world outside of school. Your life is now in your hands, and whether you succeed or fail, depends on you and your relationship with the world around you.

And coupled with that responsibility, you don’t live in a vacuum, thus the fourth and final face is upon you, and that is the face which reveals your obligation to society and your country. Let us stop the habit of trying to make an excuse out of most people’s shortcomings. If we wish to live in a peaceful and harmonious environment, we have to be the first to initiate the effort to make a difference.

Life is not about taking short cuts just to get immediate results. Life is about being patient, experiencing the moment and savouring the hard-earned output borne out of your wilful determination.

The politics of convenience and comfort is everywhere, and often, we are influenced to join the bandwagon for our own ease. But just imagine what that act does to all the 14 years spent trying to be capable and wise, and trying to be good.

I don’t want to sound like a morality preacher, but if we exhibit this positive attitude and communicate these to other people, then we can say we are truly learned, not just educated by our institutions.

The goal of education is not just merely to graduate students with basic competencies and skills of arithmetic, logic and reasoning.

But as Ulrich van Lith says it...

“The main task of the education system and its elements is to communicate the values, attitudes, knowledge, skills and competencies which society needs for its communal existence, which the economy and country needs, as well as to investigate the talents and inclinations of pupils and students, and to mould, educate and train the latter in such a way that they are able to use their natural talents to their best advantage, both for themselves and society as a whole.”

The bottom line is that our actions should be morally and intellectually grounded, founded on the idea that we exist for the good of ourselves and others.

Why should we give back to our country and society? It is society that guaranteed our inviolabilities as human beings, the free development of our personalities, our free choice to choose our education and free opportunity to live our own lives.

Our democratic system has allowed you, us, to aspire for our own ambitions and dreams, and has given us the chance to realize it in our own time and space.

True, there are many problems that exist in our country. True, there may have been points in our life before graduation that we felt our rights are violated.

But we have been given an opportunity that not a lot of people have been given – the right to live this great moment in our lives: GRADUATION.

So for now, I say congratulations, I say thank you to the wonderful parents who made this day possible, and I also remind you of the responsibilities that you owe to yourself and to your parents, and most importantly, emphasize and entail a value of personal responsibility that you must indoctrinate yourselves to – a responsibility that you owe to your country.

Your graduation may have four faces, but have no fear, for this occasion will always stand out as a great moment in your lives that no one can take away from you.
Long live graduates of Batch 2010-2011.

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