Graduation and Gratitude

Dear OSD Staff and Partners,

What an awesome graduation ceremony last night!

I loved seeing many of you there supporting kids and seeing your relationships with them last night and when they were on their senior walk yesterday. You truly loved them to graduation.

I was thinking about the question Mr. Ruff posed last night: "What are you doing with your life?"

YOU are changing lives - literally altering their course! Thank you for everything you did, in some cases right up until the last minute, to get those kids to graduation. You inspired them, supported them, sacrificed, and relentlessly did whatever it took so they could get to that point of walking across that stage yesterday prepared for more learning, work and citizenship today.

"Preparing ALL students for college, careers and life" is way more than a slogan here. You invest deeply in students until it's a fact.

I can't wait to hear the stories and memories that the students you are working with right now will tell when they stand on that graduation stage. It may not seem like it now, but take heart - they remember and it matters to them.

Last night was a great culmination of years that you poured into students' lives! THIS is why we do what we do! This is what we are doing with our lives!

A big thanks goes to Renee Polly for a coordinated and smooth operation!

With gratitude,
Marci

Dr. Marci Shepard
Superintendent
Orting School District