Ceremonial Speech

Good Morning every one here,

I am humbled and honored to have the opportunity to bid you farewell from your juniors. On behalf of my class, I want to congratulate every one of you on your successes at UCET.It seems like just the other day when we were all talking about our senior'sfarewell as they move on. I remember thinking that it would be hard to say goodbye ... and I was right - it is hard. Yet I consider myself fortunate to have met such a special person ... a person that we care so much about ... that it makes saying goodbye to them hard! As we say goodbye, we remind ourselves that farewells are not forever, nor are they the end. They are simply words to say that we will miss you dearly and that we will remember you fondly.

I still remember the day when I first met my seniors and to tell the truth I was really terrified by those sweet funny things which they made me and my class fellows do. but later we all realized that it was just to increase our confidence level and to decrease the communication gap among us.And I hope that this is quite an example to demonstrate their well wishes for us.Although we may be separated by time and distance in the interim, nothing will diminish the important role that you have and always will play in our lives. We wish you happy adventures, fantastic new friendships, amazing experiences and the journey of a lifetime.

Richard Bach says, "Can miles truly separate you from friends? If you want to be with someone you love ... aren't you already there?"

And so it is ... and always will be with you as we carry you always close to our hearts.

Most of our life is a series of images. They pass us by like towns on the highway. But sometimes, a moment stuns us as it happens. And we know that this instant is more than a fleeting image. We know that this moment... every part of it... will live on forever.

The important thing is not to be bitter over life's disappointments. Learn to let go of the past, and recognize that every day won't be sunny. And when you find yourself lost in the darkness of despair remember, it's only in the black of night that you see the stars, and those stars lead you back home.

"So don't be afraid to make mistakes, to stumble and fall, because most of the time the greatest rewards come from doing the things that scare you the most. Maybe you'll get everything you wish for. Maybe you'll get more than you ever could have imagined. Who knows where life will take you. The road is long and in the end, the journey is the destination."

In the end I will like to say that where ever you go you will remain closer to our hearts. May you conquer new fronts of life. May Allah bless you with a happy successful life and I presume that in coming days u will be our ideals and all of us will be determined to follow your footprints and have full advantage of your academic experiences. Of course we are lucky to have spent 3 wonderful years in your company as dignified companions.

May the road rise up to meet you, may the wind be ever at your back. May the sun shine warm upon your face and the rain fall softly on your fields. And until we meet again, may God hold you in the hollow of his hand - Irish Blessing

The speech by a Salutatorian is generally about the overall school experience, how the student life progressed and how the student experience enriched over the High School years. Often, it also discusses the future path for classmates, with novel inspirational message that can uplift the fellow students, teachers and parents alike. Famous Salutatorians include First Lady Michelle Obama, Singer John Legend, Singer Carrie Underwood and Author Eric Segal. The salutatorian speeches are often found to be higher in merit and quality than other graduation speeches

To exemplify various aspects the Salutatorian speech, here is presented one of the most popular and exceptionally outstanding Salutatorian speeches of 2010, from Boston Globe - Boston.com. This speech is entitled "Operation Red Sprinkles", written and presented on June 12, 2010, by Anisha Shenai, Salutatorian from Danvers High School, MA.

Operation Red Sprinkles

Anisha shenai, Salutatorian, Danvers High School, MA.

"Good afternoon and welcome. I would like to acknowledge and thank family, friends, teachers, administrators, and of course, fellow members of the Danvers High School class of 2010 for making the past four years as memorable and as amazing as they were.

Though we find ourselves today as seniors on the brink of graduation, I ask all of you, for just a moment, to remember the September of 2006, when we first entered Danvers High School as timid young freshmen. We perceived high school as an uncharted no-man's-land. We wanted simply to survive. The pursuit of excellence took second priority, as we strived to be merely good enough - only satisfactory academically, socially, and in extracurriculars. Overwhelmed, only in the beginning, we resigned ourselves to the ordinary; we resigned ourselves to the "plain vanilla," or we resigned ourselves to the "plain chocolate," as I prefer to say. Let me explain what I mean by this.

When I was younger, my mother was an avid supporter of all sorts of activities designed to bond mothers and daughters. One year, she decided that, with Valentine's Day just around the corner, making a cake together would be wonderful. As I, at the time, only had all the culinary prowess of any other typical eight-year-old, she enlisted me to decorate and frost, while she would mix and bake. We set out the ingredients and were finally ready to begin. Suddenly, my mother was alarmed to see that nowhere within this cluster of eggs and flour did we have any sprinkles! A Valentine's Day cake without red sprinkles simply would not do, she declared. So we embarked upon a mission: Operation Red Sprinkles.

The first store that we visited held only brown chocolate sprinkles. They had run out of red ones, as it was so close to Valentine's Day. I suggested we just purchase the brown and be done with it; they all taste the same anyways. However, my mother refused. She insisted that we would find them eventually. Indeed, one and a half hours and six stores later, there they were, sparkling scarlet in a plastic shaker.

Later, I asked my mother why she was so insistent that we find those red sprinkles, instead of accepting the plain brown ones that were so readily available. Was it really worth all that time and effort to search for the red, merely for the sake of aesthetic value? Her answer was enough to make me understand.

"Rani," she began, employing the Indian term of endearment she saves for such particularly significant conversations. "Brown sprinkles are basic. They are good enough to make the cake taste as it should, but not for anything more. Red sprinkles are beyond just simple; they are extraordinary." And suddenly I could see. The red sprinkles, in serving a purpose that transcends the mere gustatory senses, had in them a flicker of passion, of life. They were greater than mediocre. They were greater than plain. They were greater than mere sprinkles. They were red sprinkles, and that made all the difference.

The great American author Mark Twain once stated the following: "Don't part with your illusions. When they are gone you may still exist, but you have ceased to live." In her quest for the red sprinkles, in her desire to follow the dream rather than to simply opt for the easily attainable reality, my mother showed me the worth in searching for life rather than accepting mere existence. To settle for the ordinary brown would be to concede to the need for basic survival, rather than to continue to strive for anything more.

Fellow classmates, in our four years at Danvers High School, I do believe that every one of us has abandoned the primitive search for brown chocolate sprinkles -- the search to which we so desperately clung when we first entered high school. Instead, we now embrace the ambition for red sprinkles, the desire to be extraordinary. In our time in high school, we have all realized that it is not enough just to get by, just to be simply average. We have reached the understanding within ourselves that neutrality and simplicity are not enough. And we have seen the need to be passionate rather than to float along unfeeling, rather than to simply exist.

Each of us in the class of 2010 has found that source of passion, that shimmering spark of life which allows us to go beyond mere existence. We are gifted musicians. We are inspired artists. We are champion athletes. We are dedicated employees. We are serious students, and above all, we are more than what we once thought we could be. We were able not only to survive the perceived no-man's-land of high school, but to flourish with intensity and power. As a class, we went beyond our original hopes of mediocrity, to create and attain dreams of magnificence. After four years in high school, we have become rational but passionate, pragmatic but emotional, logical but idealistic. We contradict ourselves and it is wonderful. It is wonderful, because I know that it is this paradoxical state that will guide us. It will ground us in the realities of the present, but still never allow us to cease forging onwards and upwards, forever in pursuit of that glimmer that separates the plain from the remarkable.

So be remarkable. Let a flame of passion illuminate your way. Be extraordinary. Stray from the dullness of shadows, into a radiant glow. Feel. Dream. Live. And never concede. Never settle for anything less, as you move full speed ahead in the quest for a life full of light and color. Thank you."

You are three men of sin, whom Destiny,

That hath to instrument this lower world

And what is in't, the never-surfeited sea

Hath caused to belch up you; and on this island

Where man doth not inhabit; you 'mongst men

Being most unfit to live. I have made you mad;

And even with such-like valour men hang and drown

Their proper selves.

ALONSO, SEBASTIAN & c. draw their swords

You fools! I and my fellows

Are ministers of Fate: the elements,

Of whom your swords are temper'd, may as well

Wound the loud winds, or with bemock'd-at stabs

Kill the still-closing waters, as diminish

One dowle that's in my plume: my fellow-ministers

Are like invulnerable. If you could hurt,

Your swords are now too massy for your strengths

And will not be uplifted. But remember--

For that's my business to you--that you three

From Milan did supplant good Prospero;

Exposed unto the sea, which hath requit it,

Him and his innocent child: for which foul deed

The powers, delaying, not forgetting, have

Incensed the seas and shores, yea, all the creatures,

Against your peace. Thee of thy son, Alonso,

They have bereft; and do pronounce by me:

Lingering perdition, worse than any death

Can be at once, shall step by step attend

You and your ways; whose wraths to guard you from--

Which here, in this most desolate isle, else falls

Upon your heads--is nothing but heart-sorrow

And a clear life ensuing.