‘I hated school’: Student goes off script, criticizes high school’s culture in commencement speech

Jessica Votipka The Grand Island Independent

GRAND ISLAND, Neb. — The student speaker at Grand Island Senior High’s graduation ceremony used the platform to call for an improvement to the school’s culture.

<p>Grand Island Senior High graduate Kenny Morales gives the oration during graduation Sunday at the Heartland Event Center.</p>

JOSH SALMON, THE INDEPENDENT

Grand Island Senior High graduate Kenny Morales gives the oration during graduation Sunday at the Heartland Event Center.

Kenny Morales, who graduated from GISH on Sunday, called his speech “Opening Pandora’s Box.” After a generic opening, the box opened in paragraph two, to shouts of support from some in the audience.

“I don’t know about y’all, but I hated school,” Morales told the crowd, per a transcript of the speech provided by Morales.

He touched upon the number of physical altercations at GISH, saying “… while each fight has its own story, they all stem from the same problem: And that is the culture at our school.”

In his speech, Morales contended: “We lie, we pretend and we hide the truth with selective facts on positive things occurring around the school, instead of being honest and addressing the issues head on. We attempt to fix the issue by pulling them like weeds instead of fixing the underlying issue.”

District decisions are made by administrators who “sit in a room … everyone is guarded from the truth,” Morales told the Independent.

The district declined to comment on Morales’s speech. Grand Island Public Schools Board of Education President Hank McFarland declined to comment before discussing the situation with other administrators.

Morales said he felt his speech consisted of constructive criticism.

“I really don’t think I was too critical,” he said.

He told the graduates and guests the solution is raising expectations.

“Sure, at first there will be resistance, but in the long term there will be leaders within the class that will emerge and set the standard we so desperately need,” Morales said in the speech.

Morales said the speech was not necessarily about shaming the school.

“It was more about that message (of raising expectations),” he told The Independent. “I just wanted to start a conversation.”

Morales said his calculus classmates encouraged him to submit a speech — in his own words. Knowing the speech he wanted to write wouldn’t pass prior review, Morales enlisted ChatGPT, an artificial intelligence chatbot, to compose a decoy. ChatGPT uses data and computing techniques to mimic human conversation.

Grand Island Public Schools Communications Director Mitch Roush described the graduation speech submission process:

“Students who are interested in speaking at graduation can submit their names and draft of the speech that they would like to give,” Roush said. “Then a group of GISH staff review them and score them blindly.”

From there, GISH Executive Principal Jeff Gilbertson assesses the scores and “makes the final call from there,” Roush explained. “Once that’s done, (the student selected) works with Mr. Gilbertson to refine their message and make sure they feel confident in what they’re doing.”

At that point, Gilbertson gives the speech a final review, Roush said.

Morales didn’t say how long it took to manufacture the submitted speech, but did note the delivered speech was written in about a half hour, the day before commencement.

“It’s just holding people accountable,” Morales said.

According to Nebraska Department of Education data, 553 GISH students graduated from the school in 2021-2022 — 83.41% of the four-year cohort for that class. State data is not yet available for the class of 2022-2023.

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