29 get diplomas at St. Joseph High School ceremony
Published: June 7, 2010
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The graduates make their way to their seats during the St. Joseph High School Commencement Exercises at St. Patrick's Catholic Church in Frederiksted Sunday afternoon.
ST. CROIX — In a subdued ceremony — punctuated by outbursts of joy as graduates, one by one, were awarded their diplomas — the members of the St. Joseph High School Class of 2010 bid goodbye to their high school years on Sunday.
“It’s great. I hope that they’re all successful in whatever it is they decide to do, even if they change their minds along the way,” graduate Marcel Galiber II said of his classmates as they greeted family and friends after the ceremony. “I also hope that they become role models and are able to inspire people.”
The graduation ceremony for the Catholic high school included a graduation Mass at St. Patrick’s Church in Frederiksted before the commencement exercise. Graduates took communion and participated in the service.
The Rev. John Mark, school president, delivered the homily during Mass, telling the 29 graduates that for many, life becomes an endless search for happiness. He told them that they could find that happiness in God.
Deborah Skalkos, head of school, encouraged the graduates to keep moving forward, to demand more, and to do more.
“I urge you to become agents of positive change,” she said.
She described valedictorian Duvanté Vegas — who graduated with a 4.0 grade point average — as “the epitome of a good student.”
In an interview, Vegas said that he believes there is no single path to success. Personally, the key for him was to keep his focus on what was important to him, he said.
“Many students go through their education concerned about grades,” he said. “My focus was actually to procure knowledge while attaining good grades.”
Vegas said that from very early on, language and words came naturally to him, so he did not have to spend a lot of time studying for subjects like history and literature. However, other subjects, like calculus and trigonometry, did not come so easy.
“I would have to do intensive and rigorous study,” he said, adding that he would study with friends who were better at the subject than he was or in solitude, after reading something that inspired him.
One of the challenges Vegas had to overcome was learning to balance his extracurricular activities, his studies, and other aspects of life, he said. Vegas participates in swimming, martial arts and acting, among other school activities.
“The hardest thing for me was to introduce balance into the equation,” Vegas said. “To learn when to say no and when to say yes.”
His advice to other students is to “always take two sets of notes — one to ace the test and one to help you throughout life, because facts are never anything you should learn and discard.”
Vegas plans to attend Howard University and major in economics, with a minor in political science, with an eye toward attending law school at Yale. At Howard, he has earned a Legacy Scholarship to cover tuition, fees and books for four years. He’s waiting for word on a number of other scholarships, he said.
He plans to return to the territory to practice law. “I have to. There is a responsibility on all citizens of the Virgin Islands to return to the territory and give back to the community that made them who they are,” he said.
Skalkos described salutatorian Angeles Cruz as a “hard-working and determined young woman” who has “consistently given her best.”
In an interview, Cruz said that part of her motivation was the desire to make her parents proud.
“I just wanted to be the first one to get salutatorian. I wanted to work hard and get good grades, but I wanted to be the first one to be salutatorian,” Cruz said, adding that her father was a great motivator.
She mostly studies by herself, but for math, she works with her older sister, she said. Her advice to other students is to do what they can to help themselves.
“You can’t depend on anybody else to help you get successful. You have to do it on your own,” she said. “You have to want it. You have to have your head on. Nobody’s going to really get you where you want to get.”
Cruz said that another thing that motivated her — a turning point for her — was an insulting remark made to her by another student at the Junior Statesmen of America Summer Program at Princeton University. Cruz said the other teen inquired why Cruz was studying so hard and suggested that people with her heritage were “only good for cleaning kitchens and bathrooms.”
“That got me mad. It made me work a lot harder,” she said. “That’s when my whole viewpoint shifted. It was like, ‘OK, that’s what you think. Here’s a news flash for you.’ I worked hard and I showed them what I could do. I did really good.”
In her salutatorian speech, Cruz urged her classmates not to believe anyone who tells them they cannot do what they want to do — or that they are failures. “Prove them wrong,” she said.
Cruz plans to attend Inter American University of Puerto Rico and study special education.
The Most Rev. Herbert Bevard, bishop of the Diocese of St. Thomas in the Virgin Islands, congratulated all the students as the ceremony came to a close on Sunday.
Afterward, proud parents and well-wishers greeted the graduates on the steps of the church.
“I am just happy,” said graduate Daijae James. “This is what I have been waiting for. I worked hard for it.”
