Lee High Seniors Not 'Just' Any Graduates
 The scholarships and award recipients were named during Lee High's 133rd graduation exercises. |
Longtime educator Henry T. Zukowski was named an honorary member of the class as he sat in the front row in the Shed at Tanglewood with his family for his 58th consecutive graduation exercise.
"He first served his country as member of the United States Marine Corps and then he served the people of Lee as a teacher, a coach, a high school vice principal, high school principal and superintendent of our district and most honored retiree," said Principal Kerry A. Burke. "Mr. Zukowski has also been a loyal champion of the Lee schools and the town of Lee itself."
Zukowski, who retired as superintendent of the Lee-Tyringham School District in 1999, was presented with a "diploma" by current Superintendent Jason P. McCandless as the entire Shed gave him a standing ovation.
The beloved educator's memories may stretch back to his first class in 1953, but for this year's graduates, 2010 is the benchmark, said valedictorian Rahul Sangar, comparing his and his classmates' experiences to the short story "Eleven."
In the story, a young girl has a bad 11th birthday, and sees it as not just the culmination of time but as just another building block among previous birthdays.
 |
 |
.jpg) Henry T. Zukowski was named an honorary member of the class of 2010. More photos here; awards here, information on top students, here. |
Each grade, each memory, each experience has led to this day, when the graduates pull up anchors and hoist sails "to catch the favorable winds, eager to carry us away to new ventures and set out for the light of our futures knowing full well that the light of our futures will cast the shadow of 2010 behind us.
"This is our year, it has been so since the first grade and will remain so indefinitely," he continued, adding that as they find their careers, "let us not forget we were first-graders afraid to spell, seniors impatient to graduate and friends ready to storm off Noonan's beach and take the ocean of truth by storm."
While Sangar searched for "something profound," Michael Bullock, chairman of the School Committee, said it was easy to write speeches about reaching for dreams and changing the world. But with his own son, John, graduating with his friends this year, telling them "you are the hope of our futures" would more likely result in laughter.
Better, he said, to take some common sense advice from Albert Schweitzer, who once said "I don't know what your destiny will be but what I do know, is the only ones among you who will be really happy are those who have sought and found how to serve."
"Concentrate on what you can give than what you can get," he said, in shaping their own characters. "The rest will fall into place."
Burke told them to consider the five important "Fs" — family, friends, fitness, fun and faith in themselves. The class and audience was welcomed by Assistant Principal Joseph P. Turmel, Kate Maroney lead the Pledge of Allegiance and the high school band played the processional and recessional. Burke and McCandless presented the diplomas and Burke read the names of the scholarship winners and the amounts they won.
Salutatorian Avery Forget thought "it is probably safe to say that through the course of the past four years, every individual sitting on this stage has gone through the best and worst times of their life."
They'd learned who their friends were, how they could depend upon themselves and that not the mistakes, but "what we do after the mistake that helps us discover who we really are.
"It is our experiences, our mistakes, our victories and the honest advice that helped us find ourselves, that made us who we are today, and shown us who we will be in the future."
Before sending them off, McCandless said he had to tell them about their use of a four-letter word that "annoys the daylights out of me."
Too often they — and he admitted he himself — had used the word "just" to describe accomplishments, such "just going to a state college." "This word 'just,' when used that way means 'only,' or 'merely' and not one of you in this place deserves to sell your past or your future short in that manner."
He urged them to take pride in their school, their town and themselves whether entering a big college or small, the work force or the military.
"As long as you are doing what you are doing with integrity, with passion, with the aim to always do better and learn more and more all the time, then what you are doing is worthy."
Tags: graduation 2010, Lee High,
