Graduates, like The Nora School you have reached a milestone. Like the Nora School, your journey here has included a few near death experiences. Like the Nora School, you’re in great shape to face the future with optimism and with the necessary skills and tools. Like the Nora School, you can look back with the pride of accomplishment and forward with the excitement of what is to come. And like the Nora School, you need to keep exploring and learning and challenging yourself so that life remains an exhilarating journey.
Today marks one of the few times in your lives that everyone will get together just for you. Birth, graduation, marriage, death are the biggies, and you probably won’t be there to enjoy the last one, so you’d better enjoy this!
You are here because of the work of many people, most notably your parents and teachers. The members of our Board of Directors support and guide the school behind the scenes, giving generously of their time, treasure, and talent. I would like to recognize them now.
And finally, you need to thank your parents, as they have supported you far longer than we have, and, despite what they’re hoping, will continue to do so. I would like to recognize those whose dedication to you included changing your diapers, reading your bedtime stories, and paying your Nora School tuition.
Soon to be alumni, I am hopeful that you will take away from today, your last day at Nora, the same precepts I discussed with you on your first day at Nora. It may seem long ago, but on your first day, and on each first day thereafter, you went around to get lockers, photo ID’s, and to write down your goals. You also spent time with me discussing the school rules, which can be boiled down to four simple sentences that will stand you in good stead throughout your lives.
Show up on time. Do your work. Take care of your health. Treat others with respect.
Look back on your time at Nora and honestly assess to what extent I was telling you the truth.
Did you show up on time? Did that make your life easier or harder? What are the consequences in the next part of your life for showing up late? What does it say about being a person worthy of trust?
I can tell you that there are tremendous benefits to showing up on time, being a person of your word, having others see you as reliable. The Noble Truth of Buddhism is echoed in the first sentence of Scott Peck’s The Road Less Travelled: “Life is Difficult.” I don’t think you’ll find many people here today who would disagree with that statement, but I’d like to follow it up with a question, “Now What?” OK, life is difficult, now what? You still need to show up. If you have to show up, you’d might as well show up on time. It makes life slightly less difficult.
Do your work. Same questions. How was life when you did your work? How was your life affected when you didn’t take care of business? What happens in the world when you drop the ball? What happens when you follow through? And what kind of work will you do? As you do whatever work is before you as you go through your life, whether schoolwork or office work or mechanical work or the work of raising a family, is the work, and are you, making the world a better place?
What are you consciously doing to ease someone else’s burden? Might I suggest that next week you cook dinner for your family, or perhaps do the laundry? Making the world a better place can happen in small as well as large ways. In fact, if everyone were to work on the small ways our world would be a much better place.
Take care of your health. Stay sober, because it’s hard to have any lasting success if your brain is messed up. Exercise and eat healthy food, because you’ll feel better, have more energy, and be a happier person. Monster Energy drinks, ho-hos, and giant Slurpees as an occasional treat are one thing, as part of your daily diet they’re not so great. Take care of your health.
Treat others with respect. Yes, I know it’s the Golden Rule, but there’s a reason it’s called Golden. Treating others with respect doesn’t only mean your friends, or people you get along with, it also means those who rub you the wrong way and get on your nerves. This doesn’t change outside Nora, there will always be people you find annoying. One of them might be your roommate next year! This is where your room for growth lies. Paula Weymiller says that the person who annoys you the most is like a little angel sitting on your shoulder, telling you to grow up, and that you have the most to learn from that little angel and that annoying person. In the words of Plato, “be kind, for everyone is fighting a hard battle.” Treat everyone with respect.
I think you’re ready to move on.
Our goal has been to help you to pursue possibilities. The broad liberal arts education that you received at Nora has opened doors to a variety of possibilities, but note that the harder you worked the more possibilities you had. Now it’s up to you to find those passions worthy of your pursuit. Here is where the fun, and the fear, come in. You don’t have to know your passion right now, most of you will change careers at least once before you’re my age. But right now you’ll get to study and work at things that are interesting to you, and that’s the fun part of moving past high school.
But try to take courses and have experiences outside your areas of interest as you pursue your further education, as you never know what new endeavor might spark a new passion. Be open to serendipity, when a door opens, go through it and see what happens. Don’t be afraid to say “I don’t Know,” and remember that “smart people ask for help.” You’re smart, ask!
Thomas, behind that peaceful, non-violent facade lurks a peaceful, non-violent man with a quick with and keen insights. When you were in class I would often hear Robin’s laughs all the way from my office.
Carmen, you’ve had to balance more than most in terms of family and school, getting here on time, managing the sports teams, and taking care of your academics. You’ve been a great friend to many of your classmates and an all around nice presence in our community.
Fiona, remember the rules in the book I lent you and stand up for what you need. You’re a champ on and off the playing fields, and I expect that you’re going to have a great and interesting life in Ghana, Florida, and beyond.
Ronnice, as Norman said, you’ve always been cool enough to be everyone's friend. A quiet but forceful presence in our classes. I hope that you continue to get stronger and healthier as the next few years go by.
Maddie, I’m glad you decided to come to classes at Nora rather than head down to OccupyDC every day. And you’re the first person to actually pull off the tie-dye business for graduation... congratulations!
Adam, the life of the party at every prom for the last four years, you really came into your own with Trey and the band. It’s been a wild ride at times, but you’ve made it, and now on to new and bigger adventures at Hood.
Tristan, you’ve been one of the all-time stars at Nora, both on the athletic fields and in the classrooms. Philosopher, artist, sportsman, you’ve been a Renaissance man, and we’re pleased to have had you with us for four years.
Thomas, we look forward to the 2016 Olympics as we follow your running career. You’ve been a good friend and a good source of advice to many students over your four years, just remember my advice that there’s an appropriate time and place for everything. Life, even in the athletic dorms, will be much more pleasant if you remember that.
Sarah, the world needs more people like you, willing to serve others and take on adventures around the world. You’re journeys in Israel over the past two years have brought you an incredible level of maturity and insight, and we wish you safe travels as you return to further your education.
David, behind the bluster there's a wonderful, compassionate heart, and you’ve gained a great deal of self-awareness during the past two years. Remember that it’s not enough to know yourself well, you must take action on that knowledge for it to be worth anything. When you get to Vermont try to expand your horizons and get involved in lots of activities outside your dorm room, I think you’ll enjoy it! Class of 2014, you have worked hard to get here. You are survivors. Not only did you survive middle and high schools that were big, impersonal, and bureaucratic, you survived Nora, which is no easy task. Not everyone can handle it, but you did.
Seth Godin posits that “small is the new big,” and as graduates of one of the smallest schools in the country, you should understand that it’s a big accomplishment to graduate from a small school. It’s a small accomplishment to find a clique of people you get along with in a big school, but it’s a big accomplishment to get along, intimately, with everyone, even with people who annoy you and get on your nerves in a small school.
There is often a misperception that being in a small school like Nora is easy, because the teachers know you and work with you and give you lots of chances, and all of that is true. But equally true is that going to a small school is hard, because the teachers know you and work with you and give you lots of chances. There’s nowhere to hide if you haven’t done the reading, and your math homework always gets checked, and when it’s your turn to present there’s no one to hand it off to.
It’s a small accomplishment to hide in the back of a big classroom and avoid the teacher’s radar and do the minimum necessary to get by, but it’s a big accomplishment to push through your resistance and actually do the work, because you know that in Ave’s Spanish class your missing homework will be noticed.
Your parents hear if you skipped the trip to the Smithsonian, and they know when you’re not turning in drafts of your papers. Robin notices when you show up late to Physics, and Patrick notices when you didn’t do your Chemistry lab. It’s tough to stand up to that amount of scrutiny, but you have.
You’ve survived not only the classrooms, but also the whitewater rafting of your sophomore year, the high ropes and goal setting of the junior retreat, and writing your own recommendations and sharing your life stories on the senior retreat.
You set up your own senior community service, late though it may have been for some of you, and you presented your best academic work to the faculty in your Senior Portfolio presentations. You learned to balance two of the most precious gifts of adulthood: freedom and responsibility.
The freedom part is easy, every teenager gets that. The responsibility part is a lot harder. Not all that many adults get that, as witnessed by the various crises on Wall Street and on Capitol Hill. Learning when to have fun and when to work, when to sleep in and when to get up, finding where the boundaries are, and which ones it was safe to cross, these are things that your parents and teachers have to juggle every day.
You managed, if imperfectly, those four lessons with which we start every school year, it’s almost time to master new lessons, one’s that you’ll create yourselves.
A few days ago we lost a giant of American literature, Maya Angelou. As the retrospectives flowed, one of her quotes stood out to me particularly, because it reflects that to which we aspire at Nora. She said "If you are always trying to be normal, you will never know how amazing you can be."
This resonated deeply with me, because I know that as teenagers we all desperately want to “fit in” and not stand out, to be “normal” and cool, because that’s the message our culture is constantly sending.
But “normal” is boring, and “amazing” isn’t. One of the things that’s kept me at Nora for so many years is that you and your fellow students learn to become a lot more comfortable in your own skins, to be who you are rather than what the culture, or other kids, tell you that you should be. My colleagues on the faculty and Board are authentic human beings, not afraid to say “I don’t know” or “I need help.” And they’re anything but normal and boring, they’re amazing, just like you! Becoming authentic, and being comfortable with that, can be the work of a lifetime for some, and you’ve got a head start on that. This is perhaps more important than all the Calculus and Art History and Academic Writing that you’ve learned over the past four years, because with that self-confidence you can tackle all the rest. You are amazing, and I hope you leave with some confidence in that. Here are a few more pieces of advice
Continue to learn and grow. The world is an amazing place, so get out and explore it. If you have a chance to travel, take it. Growth doesn’t just happen, you have to be intentional about it.
Be self-aware, because you must first know yourself in order to grow yourself. I hope that our mindfulness practice this year will help in that regard. Along those lines, take time to reflect. Think about where you’ve been and where you’re headed, allow the growth you’ve experienced over these past years to catch up with you.
Be disciplined... motivation will get you started, in college and in life, but discipline is what will keep you growing.
Seek out positive people, because growth thrives with like-minded folks. It’s easy to be cynical and toss of put-downs, but those are the people likely to hold you back and ultimately their company will wear pretty thin.
Stretch yourself, go beyond your comfort zone. You’ll have lots of chances to do that in the next few years, take them. Leave college with no regrets for what you didn’t do.
Find good mentors. You’ve had them here, you’ll need them in life.
Help others realize their potential. For 30 years of our 50 year history our school lived in the basement of the Washington Ethical Society, who’s motto is “By bringing out the best in others we bring out the best in ourselves.” Reflect on that, and be mindful of helping others on their journeys.
So I say good-bye, my friends, hopefully only until our next reunion. You’ve learned a lot at Nora, take take lessons and keep on learning and growing.
Congratulations.
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