Kyle Kelley

Valedictorian

“Good afternoon friends, family, faculty and fellow graduates. On behalf of the Class of 2021, I would like to thank the teachers, administration, parents and friends who have supported us over the past 13 years to get us where we are today.

It’s an honor to be your valedictorian. Being recognized as the person who performed best on schoolwork shows how someone can be both a winner and a loser.

I personally would like to thank my friends for sending me homework answers, and my family for the pressure they put on me. I wouldn’t be here without you. But the truth is, the tests that we stressed about and the assignments we waited until the last minute to do, are over.

Our freshman year, the last year in the old building, is over. Our sophomore year, the only full year we had away from junior high kids, is over.

Our junior year, where we celebrated the opening of the new complex, only to be sent home for the rest of the year, is over.

And finally, our senior year, where I forgot many of you existed for the beginning half of the year, will soon be over. It seems like just last week we were out playing four square with our friends. For the sake of trans

For the sake of transparency, these past four years have not prepared me to give life advice as this speech requires. Frankly, I’m in no position to give guidance for your future just because I’m good at finding the right quizlets. I’m as terrified of what lies ahead as the rest of you. So instead, I’ll be relaying some of the best advice I’ve received at Rossford.

As the Class of 2021, we’ve been through three buildings in our four years, as well as our own houses. We started our high school journey in the memorable old building.

Every room seemed to come with its own personality, and smell. It was welcoming yet worn and lived in, and not just by the bats that would periodically show up.

Then, we occupied Owens for a year and a half. We had the luxuries of vending machines and spacious classrooms we took for granted.

Finally, we ended in the junior-senior high where we got a taste of our future. The barren walls and uniform classrooms prepare us for the inevitability of a boring office job, and the parking lot provides the traffic aggravation that accompanies said office job.

Over the last four years, it’s amazing how much has changed, how much we’ve all changed both as the Class of 2021, and as individuals.

The only advice I have, and (for some) I mean this in the nicest way possible: don’t continue to be who you were in high school.

Don’t allow these to be the best four years of your life. Continue to change and grow. Let the obstacles you face and the people you meet shape who you become. As a great social studies teacher once said, ‘Get outside of your bubble and explore what the world has to offer.’

Take advantage of the opportunities that present themselves. Join that club, take that job opportunity, audition for that play, ask that person out.

Trying new things is terrifying, but don’t let fear be the only thing stopping you. Doing things you might regret and making mistakes is how you’ll find out who you truly are. As a great math teacher once said, “Failure is the only way to learn.”

However, outside of high school, failure isn’t as forgiving.

To us, failure has meant an F on a quiz and life moves on.

In the so-called ‘real world,’ failure could mean losing your job, losing someone you love or losing your own life. So as often said by a well-known science teacher, “Quit dorking off.”

It’s possible you’ll never see the teachers who gave this advice again. This may be the last time you see some of your classmates.

Whether you keep in touch with your peers or drift away to reinvent yourself is up to each of us. There’s no string tying us all together anymore.

After today, high school will be behind us. We can’t relive our football games, English classes, band concerts or the many, many awkward encounters that come with high school. But it lies in the hands of each of us to decide how the last four years will change our futures. Thank you.”

Hailey Hitchens

Salutatorian

“Sixty-five million years ago, dinosaurs walked the earth. 1,460 days ago, we walked the halls of RHS as freshmen.

You want a real throwback? 4,745 days ago, we each sat in elementary school classes.

Where we’d invite the whole class to our birthday parties and would share birthday treats. Hands on hips, bubbles in lips to walk to the bathroom.

Competing to solve the timed tests when we just learned what that big word ‘multiplication’ meant. After the days of nap times and recesses, we would sit in class and dream of what would happen when ‘we grow up,’ when we ‘were older’. The infinite possibilities of when we’d reach a certain age and suddenly become the person we’d always wanted to be. Now the time has come when we ARE older, when we ARE grown up. When we can fully take the reins of our own lives.

Since growing older is making decisions–and recently, we’ve all made a lot– tremendous responsibility follows.

It is time that we part ways for the second time in our academic years, and this time, there will be no hand holding, nor numbered order line to guide us, unlike our elementary years. It takes hard work to truly become independent.

But everyday spent together in Rossford High School is one more moment preparing us for this point in our lives. One more moment tallying into the final score of our early careers.

Even the most seemingly unimportant events become those defining moments. It’s the tear-soaked tissues sponsored by your grades or the difficult days. It’s winning, or even losing, the biggest game of the year. Whether it’s followed by running to your teammates cheering, or that disappointed bus ride home. It’s the sweat-filled gym at Homecoming, the popcorn-covered bleachers at football games, and even the paint-crusted stage after the latest drama performance.

It’s the Gizmos, the IXL minutes, Kahoot games, Quizlet sets and even those dreaded Ed-Puzzles, Wizermes and Flip grids, bonding each and every one of us together.

It’s taking on schooling together even when the whole world is falling apart. It’s uniting as a class for what feels like the toomanieth time in our unique years at RHS.

It’s surviving being uprooted, moving in and out of buildings left and right. It’s the teachers who held you to those high standards because they knew you would be even better for it. It’s the families offering support, advice (whether you asked for it or not) and love. It’s the best friends that counted down the last days with you, until maybe you realized that the time was moving a bit too fast.

It’s each and everyone of us: because we all made it. We grew up. To sit in these chairs and wear a silly hat– that’s getting older. So shout out to us, and making even the worst of our days at this school into good memories.

Thank you to all the parents out there who played such a crucial role in all of our lives.

Thank you, to my own Mom and Dad, for raising me to be the person I am today, without you I quite literally would not exist. But beyond that, you’ve given me more love, guidance and acceptance than I could ever ask for. Grandma, you are a light in my life. Hunter, thank you for being my frenemy since birth. You may have been the first to teach me how to argue, but you’ve also shown me how to love unconditionally through it. Thank you to my fellow

Thank you to my fellow classmates for providing such great company and friendships throughout our shared years.

And thank you to the teachers of RHS for molding each of us into young adults, prepared to take on the rest of our lives.

It is with your tremendous contributions and sacrifices that we will all soon be alumni of Rossford High School.

Graduates, there is not one doubt in my mind that after what we have been through together, that we will be able to find our way in the real world.

Thank you for allowing me to speak as your salutatorian. I am so grateful to be a part of each and every one of your journeys.

Go do great things, and as Troy Bolten and Gabriella Montez once sang in the peak performance of our generation, ‘High School Musical,’ remember that ‘we’re all in this together.’ As this is simply ‘the start of something new.’”

“Don’t allow these to be the best four years of your life. Continue to change and grow. Let the obstacles you face and the people you meet shape who you become. As a great social studies teacher once said, ‘Get outside of your bubble and explore what the world has to offer.’”

–Kyle Kelley, RHS Valedictorian

“It is time that we part ways for the second time in our academic years, and this time, there will be no hand holding, nor numbered order line to guide us, unlike our elementary years. It takes hard work to truly become independent.”

–Hailey Hitchens, RHS Salutatorian