By Tim DeLouchrey
Staff Writer
Graduation is right around the corner and senior Alaina Baker has been chosen to be this year’s graduation speaker. The selection committee valued her presentation, content, and personality above all others.
” I was shocked,” said Baker, “honestly, some of the most talented kids in our whole grade and some of the most academically talented wrote speeches.”
It should not come as a surprise that Baker was selected. She began preparing for her speech when she was just a freshman.
“Basically, I hadn’t been writing an actual speech, but I had a word document on my computer literally called ‘high school’ and I knew it was something I had always wanted to do, so if I had seen a quote online or in a book or something or just a story or an anecdote I would throw it all down into this document,” said Baker.
Mrs. Murphy, along with other committee members, were impressed.
“She stuck out a little more than the rest. She had great content and presented herself very well, and is well respected among the senior class,” said Committee member Betsy Murphy.
The committee consisted of Mrs. Murphy, Mr. Antonelli, Mr. Ware, Ms. Jozokos, Mr. Towers, and Ms. Keirstead. Mr. Towers had been working closely with Baker as she prepares to speak in order to help her with presenting herself.
“This was one of our best years in terms of great content and presentations,” said Murphy.
Emails were sent out, and a post was put on the senior class page early in April strongly encouraging students to try-out to speak for graduation. From these notifications, 10 students expressed extreme interest in participating. From there, students would send in drafts and present these drafts in front of the committee. Of those 10, only 9 were able to present themselves due to scheduling problems.
Seven tried out the first day, and two others followed after.
“We actually had a rubric,” said Murphy, “Not that it was followed exactly, but it was a guideline.”
The potential speakers, as well as the committee, put into ample amounts of work.
“It was great to see the amount of time and effort put into the presentations,” said Murphy.
