Strong winds blow latest graduates into the future
OCEAN CITY — It was a hot, breezy late-spring day June 17 as 278 young women and men said goodbye to Ocean City High School — some headed off to college, others to join the workforce or serve in the military.
Principal Dr. Wendy O’Neal welcomed the students and special guests, including local dignitaries and outgoing superintendent Dr. Christian Angelillo, who soon will serve his final day after leading the district for two years.
“It is an honor and privilege to stand before you as your principal this afternoon as we celebrate the culmination of your high school journey,” she told the soon-to-be graduates. “Graduation is a meaningful milestone in your life, a moment that reflects your dedication and the hard work you’ve invested throughout your four years. Today, we celebrate all that you have accomplished and eagerly anticipate the incredible opportunities that lie ahead for each of you.”
O’Neal based her speech on the theme of purpose, and how helping students find it is the hallmark of a great education.
“Purpose is not something you’re handed. It’s not printed on your diploma or guaranteed by your next step. Purpose is something you discover, you shape and build over time,” she said. “Purpose isn’t a single moment of clarity. It’s a series of choices. It’s found in how you show up, what you care about and the impact you decided to make.”
O’Neal said high school is about discovering identity.
“You didn’t just complete assignments or pass exams, you learned about who you are. You discovered your strengths, faced your weaknesses and grew in ways you didn’t even expect.”
Now it’s time for the fledglings to take flight with that purpose in mind.
“As you move forward, you will face uncertainty. There will be moments when your path feels unclear, when your plans change, when things don’t turn out the way you imagined,” she said. “It’s in those moments, purpose becomes your anchor. It will remind you where you started. Purpose isn’t just about what you accomfrfplish. It shows up in small, specific moments.”
Luke Tjoumakaris, a member of the state champion boys basketball team, delivered the Welcome Address, starting with a bit of humor.
“I was told that if you give one of the first speeches of the day, you either have to be really funny or really fast. So to conclude my speech, I want to leave you all with a few quick words,” he said.
“As a side note,” he continued, “public speaking is listed as the number one fear in America. Just coming up short is death, so please remember that while I deliver the speech to over 500 people.”
Tjoumakaris used time elements as his theme, reflecting back on yesterday, celebrating today and always looking ahead to tomorrow.
“Just yesterday, we were 14 years old. This cliche may not be literally true, but it definitely feels like it. This odd quality of the passage of time has dominated the last four years of our lives,” he said. “Time moves slowly in the moment, but passes impossibly fast in retrospect. In a strange way, the days have felt longer than the years.”
Tjoumakaris said high school provided the Class of 2026 an opportunity to find out what they were good at, or not good at — both being equally useful — and to experience new things, people and places.
“We can take so many valuable lessons from yesterday. We will remember the types of lessons that arrived wrapped in failure, in disappointment, or in the discomfort of realizing we were wrong about something we were certain of. We entered high school confidently, but then realized we had far more to learn,” he said.
Today, he said, “it is obvious to see that we have grown.”
“Today is what yesterday was always building toward. It is the accumulation of every yesterday we’ve survived, all leading to a tangible diploma,” Tjoumakaris said. “Most importantly, today we are here together, all of us, one last time, before life begins its long work of spreading us again tomorrow.”
Tomorrow, he said, is full of possibilities.
“Tomorrow we will meet a world that is complex, competitive and faster-moving than any generation before us. Tomorrow, the careers that many of us will hold do not yet have names, and the questions we’ll be forced to answer have not yet been asked,” Tjoumakaris said.
“A funny thing about tomorrow, though, is that we never actually live in it. Tomorrow lives just ahead on the horizon, always out of reach. The tomorrow we’re making for ourselves can only ever be built now with the choices we make. But today, we can become the kind of people that tomorrow will be proud of.”
Addisyn Fisher, who has her sights set on becoming a surgeon, delivered the Farewell Address.
“We’ve finally made it,” she said, calling graduation a major life milestone. “It marks the end of one chapter of our lives, and the beginning of something new.”
Fisher said the ceremony, and preparations leading up to it, prompted many to reflect on the past.
“At the same time we reflect, we also look toward the future. What will we do in this life, and how will we make our mark on the world?” she said. “The two ideas are intertwined because it is our lived experience and what we learned which will help us succeed in life.”
Fisher said she learned early that people try to force their expectations on young folks, not always to their advantage, when she told them her career goals.
“I have often been met with, ‘why not a nurse?’ The comment always carries the same message, that my goals are unrealistic. But rather than allowing these moments to set me back, I’ve turned them into my driving force,” she said. “More than that, they have taught me that the limits placed on us by others only matter if we choose to accept them. This idea seems simple, yet we find ourselves succumbing to doubt and following what other people believe far too often.
“Not everyone will believe in us, and not everyone will support us. Our future depends not on what those people say, but our reaction to it.”
– STORY by CRAIG D. SCHENCK/Sentinel staff
– PHOTOS by DAVID NAHAN/Sentinel staff
