to the legislative meeting of the Seattle Public Schools School Board.
Welcome to our student representative from Cleveland STEM High School Deka Moomin.
She is at the end of the dais here.
She will be making comments tonight we hope and I hope that she will stay with us long enough after public testimony to also give her feedback on those issues as well.
Ms.
Shek roll call please.
Director Blanford.
Present.
Director Geary.
Present.
Director Patu.
Director Pinkham.
Here.
Director Harris here and I might add that President Sue Peters is ill today so I'll be filling in for her role and Director Burke is currently in China I hope getting some rest since it's the middle of the night I understand.
If everyone would please stand for the Pledge of Allegiance.
We will now turn the meeting over to Dr. Nyland for the recognition portion of the evening.
All right.
Welcome all.
As you can tell we've got a lot of great students here tonight recognized as valedictorians or students that have distinguished themselves in their particular high schools.
I would like to recognize a very special guest.
We're joined tonight by Noah Purcell.
He's a graduate of Franklin High School.
where he was an outstanding performer for the Washington state mock trial championship.
So he comes by his current talents very well and got his start here.
Graduate of the University of Washington and Harvard University where he was editor of the prestigious Harvard Law Review.
He was a clerk for the United States Supreme Court Justice David Souder.
Washington State Attorney General Bob Ferguson selected him to be Washington State's Solicitor General and earlier this year he successfully argued for the state of Washington in U.S. federal court in the historic landmark decision that stayed the president's executive order with regard to the ban from seven Muslim majority countries from entering the U.S.
Please join me in honoring and welcoming
Hello, everybody.
Thank you so much for having me.
Thank you for that introduction.
My name is Noah Purcell.
I'm the Solicitor General of the State of Washington.
I had the privilege of representing the state in our recent case against the executive order.
I was not a valedictorian.
I got two B's at Franklin.
My mom is still mad about it.
But anyway, you're not here to hear about me.
We're here to talk about this awesome group.
So just a few words as you guys finish high school and move on.
If your experience was anything like mine, and let me apologize in advance to the Garfield folks here.
I know it's a pain to have a Franklin person speaking to you, but I'll try not to be offensive.
If your experience was anything like mine, you learned a lot academically.
I know I had a lot of great teachers when I was at Franklin.
I learned a ton about the law and mock trial from a teacher named Rick Nagel and so much about other areas.
but in many ways, more importantly, you learn a lot about the real world going to Seattle Public Schools.
You learn, I know probably many of you and many of your classmates have overcome incredible adversity to get where you are today and to move on to the next phase of your life.
So you all have a better understanding than many people, many of your classmates as you move on to college, that our country still has a long ways to go in terms of providing a really equal opportunity for educational and other opportunities to all.
And you all have the smarts and the experience and the skills to help address that.
The only other thing I'll say, and then we can get on to the introductions, is I know a lot of you are going on to college, to wonderful, wonderful universities, and when you get there, you'll find it's a different place.
Most of you are, I guess, valedictorians.
the rockstar performer at your school, all of a sudden you'll be surrounded by a lot of people and you may not be the smartest person in the school, you may not be the best tennis player, the whatever, the best, I saw someone as a bowler, you may not be the best bowler anymore, but that's okay.
What you'll find is find the things that you're passionate about, pursue those, do the best that you can at those and Don't compare yourself to everyone around you.
Compare yourself to what you want to do with your life and what's important to you.
Work hard on those things and you'll be proud of yourself when you're done.
So with that, I don't want to talk for too long.
I know you guys have, you'll probably be hearing a lot of graduation speeches over the next few weeks.
But congratulations very much on your achievements and you should be proud of yourselves and go out and make a difference.
Okay I'll call your names one by one when you come up please shake hands with Mr. Purcell hold your handshake for a minute in case somebody would like to take your picture.
Once you've shaken hands with Mr. Purcell please go back to the group here we'll have more photos later with the school board and the superintendent.
All right.
Now if I mispronounce your name I'm going to ask you to say no and then you're going to come up and pronounce it correctly.
OK.
Shake your head no if I mispronounced it and boy will I pronounce mispronounce a few.
First from Franklin High School.
Zion Pierce.
Zion Perez.
Is it Zion?
From Franklin.
Kelsey Abramson.
She's going to she'll be a student this fall at Vanderbilt University.
Again from Franklin.
Zamzam Mishela Zamzam is going to be going to South Seattle Community College this fall.
Durete Jamal Franklin High School Doretti is going to Boston University.
From Garfield.
Dane Lucas University of Washington.
Where's Ms. Ida?
Where's Ms. Ida?
OK.
You're going to say your first name.
OK.
Badatu Aida?
How'd I do?
Okay.
Ballard High School.
She's going to the University of Washington after she first goes to Seattle Central.
Tommy Nguyen.
Is that correct?
Chief Seattle High School going to Princeton University.
Michelle L-Y Michelle Lee.
Oh yeah you did spell it out.
Chiefs Health.
Michelle is going to Stanford.
From Ballard High School Elena Spasova.
How'd I do?
Okay.
She's going to be a husky.
Okay now we have from Garfield High School two Zuckermans Anna and Leah.
Are you related?
From Garfield High School both of them one at a time.
What's your first name?
Anna is coming up first.
Anna is going to Brown, Brown University.
From Garfield High School.
Are you twins?
Guess where she's going?
Brown.
Diane, Jason Dow, Cleveland High School, going to the University of Washington.
It's going to be a long commute.
From Garfield High School, going to the University of Washington, Van Pham.
From Garfield High School Sakura Kishiro.
University of Washington.
Quinn Angelou last name.
Laisakir.
Laisakir Franklin High School going to Boston University.
From Garfield High School going to Evergreen State University Graham Blair.
From Ingram High School going to University of Washington Nathan Davis.
Well you have your own little club there at Huskyville won't you?
Ni Chao Franklin High School University of Washington From Franklin High School going to the University of Washington Jasmine Woon.
Just so you know principals nominated these kids.
They were either valedictorians or had done something very special to contribute to school and community in both.
Justin Law.
Is it Law LA.
Justin is going to the University of Washington and he is from Franklin.
From West Seattle High School to the University of Washington Vince Cerbito.
Who can tell me where Elon University is?
What state?
What state?
North Carolina.
Are you the mom?
Oh good.
Wow.
From the center school going to Elon University in North Carolina, Mackenzie Martinez.
from the Center School going to the Pratt Institute, Eva Devine.
Where's Duretti?
Come on up.
From Franklin High School going to the University of Washington is From Rainier Beach High School going to South Seattle College Lionel Keith Takai From Roosevelt going to the University of California Los Angeles UCLA Sage Bitter.
And just remember you're standing with a bunch of huskies there.
Did I miss anyone?
Okay in just a moment we're going to have a group photo first with Noah.
Okay perfect.
So let's go back on the steps back here.
Everyone come on over.
Toddler Toddler folks up on top.
And we've got two steps so you could we could make three rows to make it tighter.
If you want to step on the first step or second step that'd be great.
Beautiful.
Just don't get ahead of me or I'm going to get the back of your head.
Okay if the school board would