As is the tradition in countless schools and universities around the world, ISP recently convened its graduation ceremony for the class of 2016. We are fortunate indeed to have the opportunity to honor and celebrate with our graduates and their families in one of the most beautiful cities in the world Prague, in one its splendid landmark buildings, Zofin Palace.
Each year students, teachers and administrators have an opportunity to share our thoughts about the graduates and their futures. While there were many eloquent speeches to choose from, below I reprint Isabella Wilkinson’s address, which I will call, “Where is my home?”
Bella, speaks to the anticipation of our graduate’s bright futures and to the questions many are asking. Enjoy!
Kde domuv muj? Where is my home? – Isabella Wilkinson
Isabella Wilkinson speaking for her fellow graduates
Question everything. Remain curious. Strive to understand what you know, and what you don’t, and why. Perhaps these are the greatest and most profound lessons ISP has taught us over the past few years, as its students: to keep our eyes wide open to the changing world around us; to always have the curiosity to ask questions and to retain the energy to pursue their answers no matter what.
Today, the Class of 2016 stands on the edge of the rest of their lives, ready to go off into the world to find answers to the unanswered, to question the unquestionable. Seated before you today are the world’s future leaders, engineers, writers, doctors, artists, politicians, all of whom will strive to have unprecedented and unimaginable impact on the world around them. Each of us is prepared to go off into the world with open and questioning minds, prepared to ask our own questions and prepared to seek our own answers.
However, amidst the uniqueness of our graduating class as individuals, there is a single unanswered question that I believe truly defines us as a group and brings us all together: a question that should be recognized today as we are poised to step bravely into the future. To be honest, it’s one of the hardest questions we’ve faced yet…and this is said after taking this year’s IB exams! Whether it appears on a university application form, in an interview or even just in casual conversation, this is a question many of us will never be able to answer in just one word:
“So, where is home?” Or: “So, where are you from?”
ISP has given us the confidence to question everything. That’s how we know our identity can’t be defined just by the nationality and birthplace on our passports, or by the places our family lives, or by the languages we speak. Knowing who we are can be so much more complicated than that. Or, it was, until very recently.
As said earlier, the class seated before you today is standing before the rest of their lives. It’s inevitable: within the next few months, the Class of 2016 will have dispersed themselves all over the globe, to study, to work, to pursue new adventures, to meet new people, to grow and to learn, to ask questions and seek answers. Change is on the horizon. But before you take a leap of faith, you look down to see where your feet are. And on the edge of this great unknown, we can’t help but look down to see where we’re standing. It’s really true that you only know and appreciate what you have and what you’re a part of when it’s time to let it go, and move on.
So, today, as we graduate, we can ask the previously unanswerable question once again, a final time for now. “So. Where is home?” Now, when asked “where’s home?” we can think of days spent. We remember the morning breaks spent laughing about the weekend’s events in the cafeteria with our best friends, the lunchtimes spent cramming for tests together on the floor of the senior lounge, the evenings spent endlessly exploring the beautiful city we’re so lucky to be a part of with people we’re so lucky to have in our lives.
Now, when asked “where’s home?” we can think of people. We remember the ISP family; the teachers that have helped us become the people we are today with patience and encouragement, who have believed in us and inspired us beyond words; the families that have given us the love, support and motivation we’ve needed to achieve our goals; the friends that have made us cry with laughter along the way, with whom we’ve made unforgettable memories with. We remember the post-graduates who sat where we are seated today and the way they’ve become part of an enduring and special network that neither time nor distance will end.
Now, when asked “where’s home?” we can think of feelings. We remember the nervous excitement as we walked up the back stairs to the freshmen hallway for the first time; the exhilaration of moving up a grade; the growing unease about our final exams; and now, the nervous excitement as we move upwards once again.
Now, when asked “where’s home?” we can think of moments. We remember the moments of discovery, of realisation, of learning and of growth; we remember the moment we realised a long-awaited answer to a long-term question. We remember the moments that have made us who we are as people.
This is one of them. Over the past few months, as we have been prepared to let go of ISP, a lot of things have been labeled as their ‘last’: the last IB class, the last IB exam, the last cafeteria lunch with friends, the last goodbye to the senior lounge, and the last time walking through the halls of ISP as a student.
Well, as for last words, there isn’t much left to say but this: In the words of the Czech national anthem – words that have no doubt grown close to our hearts in the past few years:
Kde domuv muj? Translation: where is my home?
Now, all there is left to say is thank you. Thank you, ISP, for helping us answer that question. Thank you, ISP, for being a home.