Friday, May 27, 2016

Harvard's 'The Most Powerful' Graduation Speech, Ever

It's the speech Harvard University is calling "the most powerful, heartfelt" speech "you will ever hear."

Donovan Livingston, a master's graduate at the university, was chosen by a committee of faculty, staff and students to speak at the School of Education's convocation, a rep for Harvard told ABC News.

Instead of a traditional speech, Livingston used spoken word to perform his poem, "Lift Off."

Livingston told ABC News that the "true inspiration behind the piece" was the fact that he couldn't perform a poem when he gave his commencement remarks during his senior year of high school.

"The teacher who was in charge...threatened to take me offstage or cut my microphone when she caught wind that I wanted to incorporate a poem," he recalled. "She wanted it to be traditional. 

So I complied, but I really wanted to address my class in my most authentic voice, which is what I said onstage Wednesday."

The poem spoke about racial inequalities in the educational system, what it means to be black at Harvard and inspired the class of 2016 to use their roles as future educators to help others realize their full potential.
Livingston told his fellow classmates in part:
"I've been a black hole in the classroom for far too long;
Absorbing everything, without allowing my light to escape.
But those days are done. I belong among the stars.
And so do you. And so do they.
Together, we can inspire galaxies of greatness
For generations to come.
So no, sky is not the limit. It is only the beginning.
Lift off."

The speech has been seen by more than 5 million people and was even shared by Justin Timberlake and Hillary Clinton.
Livingston -- who hopes to become a faculty member or an administrator at a university one day -- said he did not expect to get a standing ovation, nor did he expect the speech to go viral.

"My wife kind of did," he admitted. "But I didn't know it would be so well received. Whenever you put yourself out there especially with poetry, you're making yourself vulnerable. However it was received, I would've felt great at the end of the day because I was being myself, but the fact that it blew up the way it did is a humbling experience."

Livingston now plans to support his wife Lauren as she enters her second year of medical school at Wake Forest University and start his PhD program at the University of North Carolina at Greensboro this fall.

It makes sense for the son of two educators: His father is a retired principle and his mother is a speech pathologist, working with special needs students.

"I've always been around education, but I didn't know it was something I was really passionate about until I got to college and looked around and saw ... that everything I did catered to college access [and] college success. It felt natural," the Winston-Salem, North Carolina, resident said. "I'm just really happy to carry on the legacy of my mother and father and I'm just grateful to walk in their footsteps."
https://gma.yahoo.com/graduation-speech-harvard-calling-most-powerful-ll-ever-142752931--abc-news-lifestyle.html# 

Lift Off  By Donovan Livingston on May 25, 2016 4:40 PM   

The remarks of Donovan Livingston, Ed.M.'16, student speaker at HGSE's 2016 Convocation exercises.

“Education then, beyond all other devices of human origin,
Is a great equalizer of the conditions of men.” – Horace Mann, 1848.
At the time of his remarks I couldn’t read — couldn’t write.
Any attempt to do so, punishable by death.
For generations we have known of knowledge’s infinite power.
Yet somehow, we’ve never questioned the keeper of the keys —
The guardians of information.

Unfortunately, I’ve seen more dividing and conquering
In this order of operations — a heinous miscalculation of reality.
For some, the only difference between a classroom and a plantation is time.
How many times must we be made to feel like quotas —
Like tokens in coined phrases? —
“Diversity. Inclusion”
There are days I feel like one, like only —
A lonely blossom in a briar patch of broken promises.
But I’ve always been a thorn in the side of injustice.

Disruptive. Talkative. A distraction.
With a passion that transcends the confines of my consciousness —
Beyond your curriculum, beyond your standards.
I stand here, a manifestation of love and pain,
With veins pumping revolution.
I am the strange fruit that grew too ripe for the poplar tree.
I am a DREAM Act, Dream Deferred incarnate.
I am a movement – an amalgam of memories America would care to forget
My past, alone won’t allow me to sit still.
So my body, like the mind
Cannot be contained.

As educators, rather than raising your voices
Over the rustling of our chains,
Take them off. Un-cuff us.
Unencumbered by the lumbering weight
Of poverty and privilege,
Policy and ignorance.

I was in the 7th grade, when Ms. Parker told me,
“Donovan, we can put your excess energy to good use!”
And she introduced me to the sound of my own voice.
She gave me a stage. A platform.
She told me that our stories are ladders
That make it easier for us to touch the stars.
So climb and grab them.
Keep climbing. Grab them.
Spill your emotions in the big dipper and pour out your soul.
Light up the world with your luminous allure.

To educate requires Galileo-like patience.
Today, when I look my students in the eyes, all I see are constellations.
If you take the time to connect the dots,
You can plot the true shape of their genius — 
Shining in their darkest hour.

I look each of my students in the eyes,
And see the same light that aligned Orion’s Belt
And the pyramids of Giza.
I see the same twinkle
That guided Harriet to freedom.
I see them. Beneath their masks and mischief,
Exists an authentic frustration;
An enslavement to your standardized assessments.

At the core, none of us were meant to be common.
We were born to be comets,
Darting across space and time —
Leaving our mark as we crash into everything.
A crater is a reminder that something amazing happened here —
An indelible impact that shook up the world.
Are we not astronomers — looking for the next shooting star?
I teach in hopes of turning content, into rocket ships —
Tribulations into telescopes, 
So a child can see their potential from right where they stand.
An injustice is telling them they are stars
Without acknowledging night that surrounds them.
Injustice is telling them education is the key
While you continue to change the locks.

Education is no equalizer —
Rather, it is the sleep that precedes the American Dream.
So wake up — wake up! Lift your voices
Until you’ve patched every hole in a child’s broken sky.
Wake up every child so they know of their celestial potential.
I’ve been a Black hole in the classroom for far too long;
Absorbing everything, without allowing my light escape.
But those days are done. I belong among the stars.
And so do you. And so do they.
Together, we can inspire galaxies of greatness
For generations to come.
No, sky is not the limit. It is only the beginning.
Lift off.
http://www.gse.harvard.edu/news/16/05/lift

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