Don Bosco evermore!

My Farewell Speech on behalf of Don Bosco Egmore Batch of 2018

My Farewell speech

I stand before all of you today, on behalf of batch 2018, to respond to our teachers and

mentors. This is indeed a very emotional moment for me, as I nostalgically remember the day

when I stood on this stage 14 years ago, to deliver my first elocution speech during my

kindergarten. I fondly remember each and every teacher who groomed us from ‘A Complan

boy’ to ‘The Complete Man in a Raymond” suit today.

There are two important skills that I learnt from my beloved teachers here at Don Bosco.

First - “To Judge a person by his questions rather than his answers”

It could be quite annoying for a teacher to have a student with a ‘curious to know’ attitude all

the time. But fortunately, our teachers not only encouraged, but also seemed to enjoy all our

weird questions during class. My non-verbatim reproduction of the answers in the textbook

did not always fetch me high grades. I observed that my teachers always judged me by my

questions rather than by my answers and thus helped me to realise that education in class

could give you ‘freedom’ – the freedom to think! These thoughts become ideas and ideas

could become actions one day! What I learned from my teachers is that, finding the right

question to ask, is as important as the answer in our education.

Secondly, I learnt from my teachers “To Never underestimate anybody”

My teachers over the years have made me realise that each student in my class is like a

‘Prism’. Each one has a spectrum of talents and in order to display them they needed the

right angle of incidence. Our teachers, the ‘guiding light’ turned us to the right angle of

incidence so that it brought out the rainbow colours that represent our talents. As in a prism

what you see depends on how you turn the glass. Our teachers truly helped each one of us to

bring out our talents by giving us opportunities to participate in co-curricular activities. They

did not discriminate those who were not performing well academically and in turn helped

them to realise that they had other talents that they could be proud of and utilise to excel in

their careers. They motivated us constantly and encouraged us through our respective

attributes. They made sure that they brought out our creativity and leadership skills besides

instilling in us a strong value system. Above all they made us realise that every single

individual has some potential or the other and we should ‘never underestimate anybody’.

We are a batch that was fortunate to be part of the Golden Jubilee and Diamond Jubilee of the school. We have had five different Principals who contributed to the development of our

school in different ways. Our current principal Fr. Arul Raja, with his firm and friendly

approach meticulously instilled a good value system in us that will definitely have a lasting

impact in our lives.

My dearest friends,

I fondly remember the day when I walked into this school campus 14 years ago holding on

firmly to my mother’s hand. I knew that this was going to be a place that would not only

inspire me to do different things but also to do them differently. When I was in the Std 7,

during a written quiz competition on St John Bosco, I was surprised to see the answer that

one of my friends wrote for the question “What was Don Bosco’s last words” - The answer

written by him was “I’ll be back” ! This answer may seem humorous at the first instance

and may have been marked wrong by the evaluator but I think it has a powerful message for

each one of us.

St John Bosco’s last words may not have been “I will be back” - but these are the words that

each one of us must say to St John Bosco on the last day of our school. “I will be back one

day Father with accomplishments for Don Bosco’s glory”. The future of Don Bosco is in this

zeal that all of us should all take with us when we leave school. My dearest friends, as a

parting message I would like to quote Steve Jobs who said that "The ones who are crazy

enough to think that they can change the world, are the ones who do" – Yes we are a crazy

batch.. lets show it to the world now!

Thank you... and farewell My dear friends!

Simon Elias

XII A