Mineral Wells Independent School District 906 SW 5th Avenue | Mineral Wells , Texas 76067 ( 940 ) 325-6404 | Fax ( 940 ) 328-6088
Congratulations Class of 2021 !
Well , you made it . You have gone through seven years of elementary — eight if you went to Pre-K — two years of junior high , and four years of high school , and now you have come to this unique moment in your lives . Graduation . You will wear a funny hat that no one ever wears for any other reason ; you ’ ll wear a gown ; you ’ ll have a tassel dangling in front of one eye .
What you will find at graduation is not a finish line . It ’ s a launch pad . You won ’ t find the end of a story there ; you ’ ll find the beginning of a brand new chapter .
I don ’ t know if you realize it yet , but someday you will : the four years you spent in high school were special . Never again will you spend this many hours with friends . Yes , some of those hours were spent studying or listening to a lecture or doing hard problems . But you were with your friends all day , every day , and you were often with them again after school for any number of extracurricular activities .
Never again will you have such a vast menu of experiences at your fingertips . From the arts to athletics to technical skills to academic contests to social clubs and leadership organizations — high school placed dozens and dozens of opportunities at your feet each year . You may or may not have taken advantage of these opportunities , but they were there . I hope you did . Some of you discovered a lifelong passion for theater , or for choir , or for welding , or for computer programming . Some of you discovered a skill that will pay you hundreds of thousands or even millions of dollars over the course of your lifetime . Some of you met lifelong friends or future spouses in these halls .
And unlike most graduating classes , you confronted a pandemic . You wore masks . You social-distanced . You Zoomed . You missed certain events and had other events altered . Coronation was mashed together with prom this year . But the good news is , you got to have school . Not you “ had ” to have school . You “ got ” to have school .
And now you get to tackle the next thing . You get to go to work . You get to go to college . You get to grow up . Every day is a blessing , and I challenge you to make each of your days count . You leave behind a legacy and a memory everywhere you go — it ’ s up to you to determine what that legacy and what that memory is . Did you make things better for others , or did you just look out for yourself ? Did you give , or did you just take ?
Thirteen years of schooling is done now . But the rest of your life is a story that you will write . Make it a good one . Dr . Kuhn
2021
12 Palo Pinto County Graduation 2021