As honor to the inaugural graduation of the class of 2021, here is the speech of the valedictorian, Rushan Ajizu.
" Good afternoon dear parents and teachers, Mr.Sugita, Principal, faculty members and all who are present here today.
Additionally, thank you to the number of siblings who have also made it to the ceremony… even if it is just an excuse to get out of classes for the day.
The rest of the school, too, I’ve heard, has been granted a free day in honor of this graduation ceremony so for that, you’re welcome for graduating.
Allow me to start by congratulating my fellow graduating class. Class of 2021 at UIA International School of Tokyo, our first batch of graduates and in the middle of a pandemic at that.
This is definitely a more riveting moment than the time I won a stuffed monkey sitting in a peeled banana from a claw machine. That was a profound moment in my life. But today is set out to be undefeated.
Now, Banana Monkey aside, the Class of 2021 is the second generation of students to be celebrating our graduation under these lamentable circumstances. Despite all the hurdling setbacks and anomalous adjustments, we have made it this far. For most of us, this day marks the end of almost one and a half decades of education. It is an honor to be able to stand with such creative, intelligent individuals and I’m beyond grateful to be able to graduate with you.
When humans are faced with unmanageable states of events, it’s instinctive for us to look for a way out. We find openings, the light at the end of the tunnel to propel us forward into solution. The past one and a half years, the world has been doing exactly that; stumbling through an unlit path, figuring out where this road will end.
But for our class, this is not the first time we have been challenged with uncertainty.
We have watched our school grow into what it is today. From a smaller building back in Funabori with a different name and different identity, all the way to our brand new Kiba campus now known as UIA International School. New staff, new students, new subjects, new clubs, new activities. UIA becoming a certified testing center for Cambridge; All these changes that the school has been undergoing, the class of 2021 has witnessed from the beginning.
A lot of times, we were unsure of what would come next… where we would end up. And each and every time, we took a blind step forward, we created a new benchmark. Even with the smaller classes, I’m indebted to the tight-knit bonds that we’ve created with each other, which could not have otherwise been achieved.
It has been 2245 days since I started as a student at UIA International School. That’s 53,880 hours, 320 weekends, and 1605 working days in total. (Shout-out to Kalendar-365 dot de for the stats). All of those days, just to be here today, giving this speech to our guests and my graduating class.
When I say these figures out loud, it becomes abundantly clear to me the crucial part that UIA and the people here have played in my development as a student, a friend, and as a person.
For each of those two thousand two hundred and forty five days, we made twice as many memories.
Those who have been with UIA for years, those who have joined recently, whether you’re a staff member, a teacher, or a student: you have all been an integral part of our journey. Similarly, for those who have left; our classmates or teachers, you remain a part of the history we’ve shared as our school has grown and flourished.
And within those days of hard work, we found and shared laughter, tears, sore shoulders and fingers from bending over our desks, finishing deadlines, submitting our tests.
I remember our massage trains after long classes in 10th grade, getting homework done minutes before class began, shoveling lunch in our mouth, racing the bell.
I remember Mr Pillai as our homeroom teacher back in 9th and 10th grade and his infamous past paper chart. This would later progress to Mr Frederic, Ms Navarro, and Ms Ifra hanging out in our classrooms during lunch for most of AS before the pandemic hit.
I still have the little notes app list of things Aadya has done in class that made us laugh. Or pretending not to hear Sahil’s trap music sounding through his headphones every time he put them on. Or Aamina’s height comparison with the Halloween skeleton “Padre Junior”, who was surprisingly taller than her despite his structural anatomy being painfully inaccurate.
I remember our projects for enterprise (so much lemonade), Autumn fair, costume competitions, Science Fair, and Sports Day, where I faked getting hurt for 4 years consecutively as an attempt to avoid the 100m dash… Glad we’re past that.
Beyond these memories, as we got older, we felt the resounding change that came with every passing year.
When we began seventh grade, it started with “we’re in middle school now!”. Or “look how cute the sixth graders are!” When we began ninth grade, it was “oh my god! We’re freshmen.” When we entered 12th grade, we couldn’t believe what was coming out of our mouths; ‘Guys, we’re seniors.”
Before we knew it, we had completed our dreaded IGCSES, Cambridge Checkpoints and AS Levels. About two weeks ago, I put down my pen, took a deep breath and said, “I’m done with my A-Levels.”. I’m sure the rest of you felt the same sense of relief as soon Mr Hans, Mr Lucy or Ms Ifra stood by the clock waiting to take the last exam paper from you.
The older we got, the significance of these checkpoints became clearer to us. We were passing through these milestones together, jumping over our hurdles, figuring out who we were and what we wanted to be as we progressed through the school years. And I am so grateful that I had the opportunity to grow with these people; my classmates and my teachers. My classmates, who I owe years of laughter, friendships and memories to, and my teachers who have never let me forget that if I fall, somebody will be there to pull me up.
My teachers, especially my A-Level teachers, Ms Navarro, Ms Ifra, Mr.McKee… our 11th grade homeroom Mr Frederic, our current homeroom Mr. Lucy… the other teachers who have taught us Mr Pillai, Mr Hans, Ms Amy and of course, Mr Burns who joined UIA around the same time Aadya and I did. I’d like to give an honorable mention to Mr Imran as well, who isn’t here with us at UIA anymore but played a vital role in our classroom throughout 7th to 10th grade and even as we began our A-Levels. Thank you, to all of you for all that you’ve done for us.
I want to thank my parents, who have always gone the extra mile so that I am never scarce of opportunity. I hope that as gratitude for your sacrifice, I can repay you by becoming a functional member of society. And I’ll start cleaning up my room more often, too, which might impress my mother more than if I became President of the world.
I’d like to thank my past self, too. She was a real menace but without that growing phase of my life, I wouldn’t have become who I am today and learnt the things that I have. Most days, 14-year-old me still sits in my head and whenever I do something I’ll regret in a month, I hear her voice go, “Oh. That’s cringe.” And I have to stop and think, hey. That’s cringe.
My sister’s fourteen now and what I’m about to say next, both her and my past self might agree really is cringe. But it’s supposed to be a moving speech so let me have the moment.
Poetically speaking, the night leaves and the morning comes, the spring leaves and summer comes, flowers wilt and fruits ripen; our class didn’t back away from change and challenge, we embraced it because it’s a part of our UIA odyssey. The uncertainty was not an obstacle for us, it became a hill to climb. We nurtured our notions to bend rather than break. We crossed the roads set out for us and instead of turning away, we made it to the finish line.
But more than that, today will be both a finish line and a starting point. With hope, I believe that we have solid futures ahead of us. Wherever we go from here, the memories we have made at UIA, the people we have met, the people we have become; these things will stick with us.
Six years ago, a 12 year-old-me met our seventh grade class for the first time, and I wondered where I would end up. To answer the question I had, it would be fitting to end with a monumental quote from somebody important. Since we read his works during my literature classes, which were some of the highlights of A Level years. I would like to use a quote from Orpheus Descending by Tennessee Williams;
“The future is called “perhaps”, which is the only possible thing to call the future. And the only important thing is not to allow that to scare you.”
Once again, congratulations to the class of 2021. You’ve made it this far and you’ll continue to succeed tremendously. Let’s not let these uncertainties stop us from striving for what we were created to pursue.
Thank you."Congratulations to Rushan for being valedictorian and congratulations to the graduating class Aadya, Aamina, Rushan, and Sahil. UIA wishes you good luck in your futures!
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