Westhill Graduates Celebrate Persistence and Diversity

A total of 43 Westhill Institute seniors - the largest graduating class in the school's 16-year history - attended commencement services at the Santa Fe campus' outdoor auditorium on Friday, June 19.

After the 12th-graders filed onto the stage to Edward Elgar's traditional processional march, "Pomp and Circumstance," Westhill board president José María Riobóo Martín offered a brief welcome to both students and parents, along with a few words of advice on how to best use the knowledge that they had culled from their academic experience in their future lives.

Although many of the graduates would be leaving Mexico in the coming months to attend universities around the globe, Riobóo Martín said, "the extraordinary friendships and wealth of global citizenry" that they had enjoyed during their time at Westhill Institute would always be with them.

Saudi Arabian Ambassador to Mexico Muneer Ibrahim al-Benjabi, who offered the ceremony's keynote speech and whose son Ibrahim Marwan was among the graduates, noted that the students were blessed to have attended a trilingual school with a multinational composition and perspective.

"My 22 years of services within my country's diplomatic corps gave me the opportunity to get to know many diverse cultures and civilizations," the ambassador said.

"As a result, I have come to the conclusion that exposure to so many different nationalities and ethnicities gives us all a better understanding of people in general."

Al-Benjabi added that that international sophistication was crucial to the establishment of global peace and the elimination of ethnic stereotypes.

Westhill Institute class of 2009 valedictorian Kim Jae Hong later spoke about the importance of persistence despite initial failures in life.

"We all faced failures on one level or another during our four years of high school," he admitted, "but the important thing is that after those failures, we picked ourselves up and tried again, and now, here we all are, graduating and looking forward to the next stage of our academic and personal development."
Kim, who will attend college in the United States next year, said that, in the end, it does not matter how many times a person may fail, as long as they continue to strive towards their goals, which will make eventual success inevitable.

Ezequiel Elias, the class salutatorian, echoed Kim's comments, comparing the high school experience to a rollercoaster ride with endless ups and downs that takes students to the portals of adulthood.

Before the graduates received their degrees from Westhill headmaster Jerry C. McGee, the school's curriculum coordinator Albert Wynder reminded them to follow their dreams, even if those dreams did not promise financial enrichment.

"Do what you want to do in life, no matter what others may tell you that you should be doing," he said.

"Find something that will set a fire in your soul and never give up on that dream."

Most of the Westhill graduates said that they would be going on pursue advanced studies at colleges in Mexico, including the National Autonomous University of Mexico (UNAM), the Tec de Monterrey, the Universidad Iberoamericana, the Universidad Anahuac and Westhill University.

Some of the students will be attending colleges abroad, such Texas A & M, the University of Pennsylvania, the University of Virginia and Westminster College in Salt Lake City, Utah.

With two campuses offering classes from pre-kindergarten through grade 12, Westhill Institute in a trilingual school accredited by both the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools (SACS) and the AvancEd in the United States.