CHESHIRE, Mass. — The Hoosac Valley High School class of 2017 looks to the future with a strong foundation from the past. 

 

Noah Matrigali asked each of his classmates to take one final look around as he led the class of 2017's address on Friday night.

 

"I want everyone in the class of 2017 to look to their left now to your right .. today is sadly the last day you will see all of the people you have grown up with together in the same room," he said. "A lot of us have spent a fifth of our lives with the people that surround us and sadly that portion has ended."

 

Matrigali told the 62 other graduates that their past defines them and everything from their past will help them now in the present.

 

"Today marks one of the biggest days of our lives and it marks everything we have learned in school and from our parents," he said. "We are growing up, actually we are grown up." 

 

He said the future looks bright for this class but to remember they will always have a home to fall back on.

 

"All I have to say for the future is this whatever it is that you do or wherever it is you go try doing it for the right reasons and also make sure you are happy," he said. "If things don't work out and you think you are on your own, know that you will always have a place to go back to. A family that started here at Hoosac Valley."

 

The graduates had already walked through C.T. Plunkett and Cheshire Elementary schools on Thursday morning to visit former teachers and show the younger members of the "family" what awaited them in the future. On Friday evening, they marched into the gymnasium two by two under an arch of red and white balloons.

 

They sat on the bleachers under a large sunny banner that proclaimed "I hope when the moment comes you will say 'I Did It All.'"

 

Salutatorian Olivia Bresett shared Matrigali's sentiment and, after thanking her teachers, said everything that the class of 2017 has learned at Hoosac has prepared them for the future.

 

"As we look to our future I hope that we are able to accumulate all of the knowledge and all of the advice that we have been given throughout our long hard years of learning," she said. "As we make our journey out of high school and on to the path that we have chosen, we will carry with us not only what we have been taught in school but also the many life lessons we have gained throughout our experiences."

 

Valedictorian Christopher Larabee Jr., who was last to speak, recited some of the many accomplishments the class of 2017 made on the field, in the classroom and on the stage and said it is destined for great things.  

 

"We have some great talented people here tonight all of those things are just some of the amazing things the class of 2017 has accomplished but we haven’t even started yet," he said. "The cliché of this ending is a whole new beginning is true for our class."