WESTVILLE ROAD
The graduating class of 2018 from North Nova Education Centre had a milestone in their lives celebrated in a packed-full arena at the Pictou County Wellness Centre.
Friends, family, facility and dignitaries from across Pictou County showed how proud they were of the 238 graduates on Wednesday evening.
Looking back, valedictorian Chad Russell said the task of writing his speech was “a great allegory for life at this age,” referencing the fact that he and his fellow grads are “pulled in so many directions by pretty much everyone in our lives: our parents, our siblings, our friends, our teachers.
“Making any type of decision at this age is tough… it’s daunting to face a decision at this age that will affect the next number of years and probably the rest of your life,” said Russell. “I know it was hard for me to make a choice to do something for the next four years when we as a country basically decided that a three-year cellphone contract was too much of a commitment.”
Russell spoke fondly of the growth and experience he gained, playing with the NNEC Gryphons, quipping that “around school I guess I’m kind of happy-go-lucky… but not when I play against Amherst.”
When congratulating former basketball rivals at the NSSAF Celebration of School Sport, Russell reflected on how “things that mattered so much not long ago just don’t matter anymore. And some of the things that never mattered are beginning to matter so much.”
Russell spoke to guests and his fellow grads about the many unexpected memories he and they cultivated while in school, referring to dodgeball tournaments, broken fountains and the students-vs-teachers basketball game, noting that some of the best times to be had at NNEC were things that “weren’t supposed to happen, or weren’t moments when we were trying to make the most of it,” where meaning was found in the most unlikely of places.
Russell mentioned the negativity that gets associated with today’s youth, and the community, saying, “I don’t know how many years (New Glasgow) has been ranked as one of the worst places to live in Canada. But that comes from an arbitrary rating system and is based on things like the types of cars people drive, or the stuff coming out of the pulp mill.
“It doesn’t take into account the people who live here are good for having each other’s back… and when one of our students needed a bone marrow donor, we had the biggest turnout in the history of the Get Swabbed clinic in Nova Scotia,” he added.
“Our time as Gryphons has been reduced to minutes. I bet plenty of people have asked you if you are ready to graduate, but there is no such thing as ‘ready,’ only ‘out of time’ and ‘sick of waiting,’” said Russell.
“It’s been an honour and a privileged spending these years with you. We will forever be linked as part of each other’s lives at this special age…. We have watched each other figure out who we want to be; capture victories and suffer defeats; make mistakes and learn from them; and lose some of the pure innocence of our past but gain some strength and wisdom that will hopefully drive our future.”
