By CHRISTIAN MONTERROSA | Reporter
Stadium by the Sea at Palisades Charter High School, set to the backdrop of the actual sea, hosted hundreds of families excited to see their loved ones graduate on Thursday, June 7.
The school’s prominent figures, including Principal Dr. Pam Magee and Los Angeles Unified School District board member Nick Melvoin, opened the ceremony, congratulating the leaders of tomorrow.
Out of the 701 students graduating, some have committed to colleges in 25 states throughout the country and eight will study abroad, according to Magee. Six have enrolled in the armed forces and three have been accepted into military academies. Over 100 finished with a 4.0 GPA.
Melvoin told the graduating class of a harder time in 1968 when students just out of high school protested their inability to vote.
“We need you, Class of 2018, to keep asking why not,” Melvoin said. “Even if the things that many of you want to change—gun control, immigration, climate change—even if those things may seem out of reach, so too did the vote at 18 for the Class of 1968.”
Magee thanked her fellow Pali High board members, faculty and staff. She said she was proud of yet another group of students who had taken advantage of their education and offered words of wisdom for the future.
“You have already demonstrated that you have the tenacity and ability to improve yourselves and to improve your school,” Magee said. “So I encourage you, as you leave tonight, to be open, to listen and to engage with people who have different opinions and perspectives, as you already do.”
Pali High senior Giselle Murillo gave the final speech before diploma cases were given out. With her phone in her hand recording the final words, Murillo said, “Let the world be witness to this matter, at this time, on this field. As we proudly shout, ‘We did it.’”
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