Welcome to Hoffman Estates High School’s graduation ceremony! Below, we’ve provided copies of the graduation speeches. If you need to change the language on this page, click the drop down menu in the top right corner of this page to select a language from the list. *Note, some speeches may not be available.
Congratulations District 211 Graduates
Translation provided by GTranslate
National Anthem
WELCOMING REMARKS
Michael Alther
Principal
Again, Welcome to all on this very special occasion where we honor and celebrate the 51st graduating class from Hoffman Estates High School…the Class of 2026. At this time I would like to welcome Township High School District 211 Board of Education Secretary – Michelle Barron and Board of Education President Steven Rosenblum.
A heartfelt thank you to the parents, families, and loved ones joining us tonight. On behalf of your graduate, I want to express deep gratitude for the unconditional love, encouragement, and support you have provided throughout their journey at Hoffman Estates High School. I know tonight brings a mix of pride and wonder…how quickly the years have passed. It feels like just yesterday they were learning to ride a bike, losing their first tooth, heading off to their first day of school with a backpack twice their size, or nervously attending their first high school dance. And now, here we are…recognizing the culmination of four years of academic achievement and personal growth.
In just a few moments, we will recognize each graduate by name as they receive their diploma. In honor of every student’s achievement, the Class of 2026 has asked that we hold our applause and celebrations until the final name is read, allowing each student to be recognized with the dignity and attention they deserve. Thank you in advance for helping us uphold this tradition.
I would also like to extend my sincere appreciation to the faculty, support staff, maintenance team, and administration of Hoffman Estates High School. Together, you have created a learning environment unlike any other…one that not only values academic excellence, but also understands that the journey is just as important as the destination. Over these four years, you have helped lay a strong, supportive foundation for the Class of 2026, focusing on achievement, growth, and positive learning experiences. Tonight, as we gather here as one family, one community, we recognize these collective efforts alongside the incredible accomplishments of our graduates.
The Class of 2026 has never just been about getting to this moment…it’s been about how you’ve grown to earn it.
Because four years ago, as freshmen, you were challenged to do something important…as I visited your freshmen foundations class for the first time, you were asked to visualize this very moment. As you closed your eyes those short 4 years ago…I challenged you: to see yourselves crossing this stage and to feel the pride of accomplishing something meaningful.
And now you’re here.
But let’s be clear…you didn’t get here by chance but rather by a series of your choices.
You’re not sitting here because you hoped this day would come.
You’re here because you set a goal…and you did the work required to achieve it.
People often talk about luck playing a role in success.
But I don’t believe luck just happens. I believe you create it through determination, hard work, and the choices you make every single day.
Throughout your high school years and your life so far; you’ve learned something powerful: you always have a choice.
Author James Clear put it this way: “Every action you take is a vote for the type of person you wish to become.”
Think about that.
Every time you showed up.
Every time you pushed through when it wasn’t easy.
Every time you chose to keep going instead of giving up…You were casting a vote for your future. And those votes added up to this moment.
Now, you are graduating into a world that looks very different than it did four years ago. The world is changing faster than any generation before you has experienced. You have access to tools powered by artificial intelligence that can generate answers, write papers, solve problems…instantly. Where the path ahead isn’t always clear, and where adaptability, resilience, and character matter just as much as knowledge.
And back to those AI tools:
They can’t choose for you.
They can’t build your character.
They can’t decide your effort, your integrity, or your work ethic.
That part is still on you and your choice is powerful.
And even in moments over the last four years when it may have felt like your choices were limited…you never let circumstances define you. You adapted. You pushed forward.
And today, you are here not because things were easy…but because you made the choice to keep moving forward.
You found a way. You stayed committed to your goals. And you proved something important: Your future isn’t determined by what happens to you…but by the choices you make.
You are the Hoffman Estates High School Class of 2026.
Before I introduce our student speaker, I want to leave you with one final thought: As you move forward, don’t lose sight of something that will always matter…human connection. The tools around you will continue to evolve. The world will continue to change. But your ability to build relationships, to show empathy, and to truly connect with others…that will always set you apart.
Take the time to listen. To understand. To build trust. Invest in those relationships. Because your greatest opportunities, your strongest support systems, and your most meaningful moments in life…will come through the people you choose to connect with.
Class of 2026, tonight you reach a major milestone. You have SOARED during your time at Hoffman Estates High School, and you leave this place even better than you found it. We are proud of all you have accomplished and even more excited for all that lies ahead.
On behalf of your HEHS family, I wish you the very best. Remember…no matter where life takes you, you will always have a home at Hoffman Estates High School. Once a Hawk…Always a HAWK!
REFLECTIONS ON COMMENCEMENT
Bratindra Reddy Thati
Class of 2026
Good afternoon, everyone,
Before anything else, I just want to say—congratulations to the Class of 2026. We actually made
it to graduation. Somehow, even you, Hamza.
To the teachers and faculty, thank you for everything you put into us over these years. To our
parents and families, thank you for the support that made this whole journey possible. And to all
the students here—this has been one heck of a journey, and you’re the reason it was
memorable in the first place.
If everyone could give them a round of applause, they really deserve it.
I don’t want to just talk about making it here.
I want to talk about what comes after this moment.
It’s that we should keep dreaming big.
And I don’t mean that in a vague, inspirational, “follow your dreams” kind of way that people say
and then forget about a couple of minutes later.
Because right now, we’re at a point where it starts to feel normal to lower expectations. To
narrow things down. To start thinking about what’s realistic instead of what’s possible.
And I get why. That pressure is everywhere. There’s always someone asking what your plan is,
what you’re going to do next, what you’re going to become. And without even realizing it, you
start to shrink your answers.
A lot of people say high school is about finding yourself. Although, I spent most of it trying to find
my Ipad charger.
Most of the people we look up to—the people who actually do things that matter in the
world—were once exactly where we are right now.
Michael Jordan, Taylor Swift, and Barack Obama didn’t know where they would end up. They
didn’t fully find themselves in high school.
They were just students. Sitting somewhere like this at their high school graduation. Wondering
what comes next. Trying things. Failing things. Not knowing if what they wanted was even
possible.
And I think we forget that part.
We look at people who are successful now and assume they always knew where they were
going. But almost nobody does. They just kept going anyway.
And that’s the difference.
So, I want you all to see something simple that I brought with me today—a paper airplane.
At first, it doesn’t look like much. Just a piece of paper, folded into a shape. Nothing special.
And if you think about it, it kind of represents how we often think about ourselves. Simple. Not
fully formed and still being shaped.
You could look at that plane and decide it’s too small, too unimportant to matter. So you don’t
throw it very far. Or you don’t throw it at all.
That’s what happens when we start believing we’re not capable of big things. We hold ourselves
back before we even give ourselves a chance to move.
But a paper airplane was never meant to stay still.
And more importantly, it was never meant to fly only one perfect way.
The potential of the plane doesn’t come when it’s folded.
It comes from what you do with it.
The same plane can fly short or far depending on how you throw it. The same shape can fail or
succeed depending on the force behind it, the direction, and the intention.
And I think that’s a lot like us.
We’re not going to go through life perfectly. We’re going to get bent, changed, redirected,
sometimes in ways we don’t expect. There are going to be moments that feel like they take
something away from us.
All of us got here differently. Some of us are graduating with honors. Some of us are graduating
with prayers. Somehow some of us made it with both.
But none of that defines where we end up.
Because what actually determines how far we go isn’t whether we stayed perfect the whole
time.
It’s whether we keep choosing to throw ourselves forward anyway.
Because the worst thing we can do isn’t fail.
It’s deciding beforehand that we don’t even belong in the sky.
So maybe the point isn’t to be flawless.
Maybe the point is just to keep going.
To keep aiming higher than what feels comfortable. To keep believing that what we are right now
is not the limit of what we can become.
Because even a simple paper airplane can still fly farther than you expect—if it’s thrown with the
intention to do so.
If the plane goes to the floor:
Sometimes in life we will crash but we can always pick ourselves up and push ourselves to the
sky.
If the plane goes far:
If a paper airplane can fly this far then maybe we can too.
FACULTY COMMENCEMENT ADDRESS
Naz Ahmed
English Department
Principal Alther, Board Member _____, faculty, families, friends, and most importantly – the Class of
2026… welcome!
I want to start with a word you traditionally wouldn’t discuss at a graduation. A word that
tightens the chest, flushes the face, and sends us quietly retreating to safety before we’ve even
begun. And I’ll be honest with you… this is your main character moment, so you might as well hear it.
That word is: FAILURE.
As an English teacher, I’ve spent years in classrooms full of books and stories, and I can tell
you… literature is absolutely littered with failure. Atticus Finch walked into a courtroom and lost.
Romeo and Juliet reached for love in a world determined to deny it. Boxer poured every ounce of
himself into the farm and was still carted away. Caesar trusted the wrong room. Gatsby stretched his
arms toward that green light across the water and never reached it. And, Hamlet knew exactly what
needed to be done and couldn’t make himself do it. We keep returning to these stories not because of
what the characters lost, but because of what they discovered when they dared to want something –
and what they chose to do next. That’s not a tragedy. That’s the blueprint.
In all my years of teaching, this is one of the conversations I’ve had with students most often:
what if I try, and it’s not right?. And here’s what I’ve come to believe, standing at the front of a
classroom for years, watching young people wrestle with ideas bigger than themselves: failure is not
the opposite of success. It is the evidence of it. It means you aimed at something real. It means you
were in the room. But let’s be honest about what failure actually is, because I think we’ve been usingthe wrong word. Underneath so much of what we call failure is fear: fear of not being enough, fear of
disappointing the people we love, fear of a future that will not hold still long enough to plan it. Fear of
failure has a way of shrinking us before we even begin: applications go unsubmitted, ideas go
unshared, dreams go unspoken. We call it failure because fear is harder to say out loud.
But here is the truth I hope you carry with you today: failure is not an end. Sometimes it is the
very thing that clears the fog and shows you what comes next.
And Class of 2026, I know you understand that. Some of you came to school while working
jobs, helping raise families, and carrying things the rest of us could not see. Some of you found your
voice in classrooms where you had never felt heard before. Some of you changed your mind, changed
your plans, and changed your entire vision of who you thought you were becoming. No single path is
represented here, and that is not a problem to be solved; it is a strength to be celebrated.
You are graduating into a world that will hand you both: failure and fear. There will be auditions
that don’t go your way, applications that come back with a quiet no, plans that dissolve in your hands.
And every single time, you will have a choice: let the fear tell you what it means, or choose to look
closer.
When that moment comes, and it will, I hope you don’t run or give up. Feel it, name it, and use
it. What sets people apart is not that they avoid failure; it is that they refuse to let it become final.
They recalibrate, try again, and sometimes move in directions entirely different from what they
originally planned
And I say that with every ounce of love I have for each of you, because I have watched so many
of you aim high inside Hoffman’s walls. I’ve watched you struggle with hard things, get it wrong, and
come back anyway. And I’ve watched you surprise yourselves – with the grade you earned, the role you
landed, the speech you delivered, the apology you made, the confidence you built, the future you
finally started to believe in. That, more than anything, is the whole point.
Be willing to take the leap, and equally willing to change your mind if you need to. And when
things don’t work the first time, and sometimes they won’t, do it for the plot. Sit with the experience
long enough to hear what it’s trying to teach you. Because more often than not, what feels like an
ending is really the beginning of something you haven’t been able to see yet. Thank you for teaching
us as much as I hope we’ve taught you. We are so proud of who you are, and cannot wait to see who
you become.
So here is your send-off – not a warning, not a checklist, but a dare. I dare you to want things
badly enough to risk not getting them. The world out there does not need more people playing it safe.
It needs exactly who you are… restless, curious, hungry, and audacious enough to begin.
Congratulations, Class of 2026!
Dr. Judith Campbell
Superintendent
Greetings Hoffman Estates High School Class of 2026.While I am not able to be
with you in person, please know that each of you is being carried in my heart as
we celebrate this incredible milestone together.
As I reflect on my first year serving as D211’s superintendent, I can honestly say
it has been both an honor and a privilege to witness the incredible talent,
determination, and spirit represented by you, the Hoffman Estates High School
graduating Class of 2026, proud home of the Hawks.
This year’s theme, “United in Purpose, Powered by Passion,” is more than just a
phrase. It is something I have watched each of you model throughout the school
year. Whether in the classroom, on the stage, on the field, in competitions,
performances, service projects, or daily interactions with one another, you have
demonstrated what it means to move forward together with commitment, pride,
and heart.
You have distinguished yourselves in so many ways. Beyond the awards,
performances, competitions, and accomplishments, what stands out most is the
way each of you has contributed to the spirit and culture of this school
community. Your collective impact reaches far beyond any single title or
achievement.
Let me also give a special shout-out to the Hoffman Superintendent Advisory
Committee. Thank you for being a voice for your class and for helping strengthen
the connection between students, school leadership, and the future of this school
community.
Your story is not defined by one path or one success, but by the many unique
ways each of you chose to grow, contribute, and leave your mark. Thank you for
showing up every day, as your journey has brought you to this amazing space in
which we celebrate you today.
At this time, it is my pleasure to welcome District 211 Board Member, Ms.
Michelle Barron, to the podium to accept and provide remarks, as I am one of
many to say, Congratulations Class of 2026!
COMMENCEMENT REFLECTIONS
Michelle Barron
Board of Education Secretary
I want to thank you for the opportunity to speak with you all tonight. Tonight, we celebrate an incredible milestone in your lives.
It feels a little surreal to stand here tonight as a member of the Board of Education because just a little more than 10 years ago, I was sitting where you are today. I walked these same hallways, sat in these same classrooms, and wondered what my future would look like after graduation. At the time, I never imagined I would one day return to this stage in this role, so dream big and work hard toward those dreams.
Over the past four years, as you made your way through the halls of Hoffman Estates High School from class to class, you were doing so much more than learning skills, facts, and statistics. You were discovering yourselves.
Some of you discovered passions you never expected. Some of you have discovered how resilient you are through challenges and setbacks. And some of you may still be figuring out exactly who you want to become, and that is okay. Life is a journey of continual learning and growth.
From here, each of you will continue along different paths and in many different directions. For some, that path will lead to college, while for others it will lead directly into careers, military service, or new opportunities. No matter where life takes you, always remember the foundation you built here at HEHS and never stop learning.
To the families who have gathered here tonight, thank you for the support, encouragement, and guidance you have given these graduates throughout their journey. This accomplishment belongs to you as well.
Students, once again, congratulations. Be proud of all you have accomplished and excited for all that lies ahead.
On behalf of the Board of Education, I hereby accept the Hoffman Estates High School Class of 2026.