Oceana High School confers diplomas on Class of 2025 as student speakers highlight resilience and passion

Trustee Andy Lee of the Jefferson Union High School District Board presented diplomas to Oceana High School's Class of 2025 as administrators, district leaders and student speakers marked the ceremony.

Principal Maritza Torres introduced the evening and said the program centered on the graduates. Superintendent Tony Presta and Trustee Andy Lee attended the ceremony.

Valedictorian Bethany Zhao urged classmates to pursue their interests with conviction. “I ask you to go about life with passion,” Bethany Zhao said. She thanked teachers, administrators and her parents before encouraging graduates to hold on to the “passion” that helped them accomplish activities from community service to athletics and the arts.

Salutatorian Arwin Clancy Perast delivered a brief, candid address that mixed humor and reflection. “I would first like to formally apologize to the teachers on behalf of the senior class for our innumerable absences, tardies, and inability to stop talking during class,” Arwin Clancy Perast said, and later called graduation a “pivotal moment” as classmates move on to varied post‑graduation plans.

Salutatorian Sarah Monica Gazzawi spoke about trusting one’s own voice and adapting when plans go awry. “We are all mosaics of the people we've met and the moments we've experienced,” Sarah Monica Gazzawi said, urging peers to keep fighting and adapting through uncertainty.

A graduating senior, Ashley Rain Anacledo, performed an original poem titled “View from the Summit,” reflecting on the class’s shared experiences and the “view” they seek at graduation. “That view you yearn for. That view of multitudes contained in a single moment,” Ashley Rain Anacledo recited.

School staff recognized student honors and cords: gold cords for a GPA of 3.5 or above; silver cords for students who completed at least 250% of the school’s community service graduation requirement. Staff announced that the senior class completed a combined 23,617 community service hours. The school also recognized students who completed Career Technical Education (CTE) pathways in culinary arts and computer science; specific names were read aloud during the ceremony.

Corinne Hartig, the senior exhibition coordinator, read meritorious senior exhibition honorees and staff and ASB leaders read the names of graduates as diplomas were presented. Vice Principal Jose Campos and other administrators assisted in name reading and presentation.

At the close of the ceremony, district and school officials pronounced the graduates and asked audience members to remain seated until students exited.

The event combined formal conferral of diplomas with student reflections on shared experiences, service and the uncertainty of life after high school.