Remarks made to the Class of 2025 (DF Waterfront: 6/21/25)…

To the Board of Education, Superintendent Slentz, Administration, Faculty members, Parents, Family members, Friends, Students, and Graduates…

As I mentioned in my opening remarks, this is our 124^th Commencement Ceremony for Dobbs Ferry High School, and it is the 91^st group of students who have walked the hallways of our current school building which dates back to 1934. Each year, I find myself reflecting upon the history of our school as I think about my remarks for graduation, and each year I come back to words like tradition, pride, community, family, and home when I think about the most important final message that graduates should hear before leaving our nest and going off into the world.  

The theme of this year’s yearbook, “Fragment,” is poignant because it captures the idea that we are all pieces of one whole, and that the individual experiences that each of you has had while here in Dobbs has helped to create a lasting set of memories that you will all hold for a lifetime. The speech that we just heard from Brooke Bass recalled some of those Springhurst fragments (or memories), from making gingerbread houses using milk cartons / to salad and soup days, from trips to the Bronx Zoo / to participating in Moonball, an annual event that so many of you remained connected to through your high school years.

If we think about the history of our school as one long story, and with each graduating class representing a chapter of that story, or in this case a fragment, we start to think about all of the individuals who came before you, and all of those who walked across the stage to receive a diploma, just as all of you are about to do. Each of those graduating classes, the individual students who made up those classes, and of course the faculty and staff who worked with them, are small, yet critical pieces, or fragments, of the history and story of our school. For me, this is now the 14^th graduating class that I will see walk across the stage, and I am becoming more and more nostalgic as each year passes. I remember all of the graduating classes, the unique character that each one possessed, and many of the memories, moments, and “firsts” that happened along the way, all of which are just some of the fragments, that ultimately created a lasting legacy for those respective classes.   

A few weeks back, one of the graduates from the class of 2015 popped into my office with Principal Mussolini for a visit. She is now 28 years old, and had come to share that the Class of 2015 had just had their ten-year reunion at Hudson Social a few nights before. Aside from making Mr. Mussolini and I feel our age, we started to reminisce about that class and found ourselves shaking our heads at how quickly the time had passed. When she left, I pulled out the old 2015 yearbook, and found that the theme of their yearbook, “Current,” which signaled the importance of staying present and cherishing the small moments as they happen, was similar to the current theme that was chosen by this class, the Class of 2025. These memories, moments, and accomplishments are what we hold onto, and for many of you they become core memories that go all the way back to your first days at Springhurst. You will likely remember some of them in 2035 when you show up to your ten-year reunion, or you will be reminded of them by the very people who are sitting next to you now. Only then, you will all be adults and off living your lives.

In thinking about the Class of 2025 at the current moment, to use the theme from 2015, and as individual fragments that make up the whole of your class, to use our current theme, there are so many pieces that are noteworthy and worth mentioning. We can certainly mention the 46 students who are full IB Diploma candidates, an all-time high for DFHS, or the 28 science research students who competed at WESEF, also an all-time high. Or we can shift to the arts, and remember how our high school musical, Alice By Heart, was nominated for 9 Metro Awards, which is also a first in our school’s history, or how 100% of our varsity sports teams earned the Scholar Athlete Award for only the second time in our school’s history.  We might also remember some other firsts, such as our first ever Senior Salad Day at Springhurst, which was a cherished memory that many of you had from your time in Springhurst, and which we recently added as a complement to the Springhurst Walk, a tradition that was started with our graduating Class of 2016. A special thank you to Sara Selitti for helping to make that happen, the Springhurst administration, and of course graduates Lilly Williams-Ameen and Finn Carleston for bringing the idea forward.

But perhaps one of the most lasting legacies that this class will have, and time will tell on this one, and it is also the one that I will leave you with, is the message that has been inscribed on the new mural that was created by graduating seniors Verity Chao and Eliza Watkins. That mural is on display here today, and it will be another “first” for our school as we now enter a new era and generation of murals that will once again adorn the hallways of our high school. Unlike the old murals, which were paint to wall, this new mural will be hung, and includes a host of different materials, including acrylic paints, watercolors, markers, paint pens, metallic paper, stickers, and a host of artifacts that symbolize some of the fragments, or memories, from the past 13 years, and that are brought together by a common theme that was inspired by graduating senior Cody Schiff, when he said, “we are one grade, almost like a family. Some of us, we have known for a long time. Others not so much. But we have to make decisions together.”

This statement was actually made in group chat when all of you were in 9^th grade while brainstorming ideas for MAC Day posters, a tradition that was started with the DFHS Class of 2006 (next year 20^th anniversary), and there are perhaps no better words to leave all of you with today. While you will now go your separate ways as graduates, you will also be forever linked by your time here in Dobbs, the core memories, or fragments, that you’ve created now serve as your foundation, and you will always be like a family. So as you go out to carve your own path, know that you have this network, stay close, stay connected, and lean on each other through good and bad. You will find many new friends along with way, but the old ones, the ones that you have sitting beside you today, can never be replaced. Cherish those friendships, and always know that you have a home here in Dobbs Ferry.

It has been an honor to serve as your principal over these past four years, I thank you for allowing me to be part of such an important time in your lives, and I wish you the very best as you leave all of us here today.

Congratulations to each and every one of you, the Dobbs Ferry High School Class of 2025.