Following the inspiring words from our CEO, Principal Dr. Michael Fitzgerald — Principal of Schoolhouse & Middle School at Northern Academy — took the stage to share a message that moved every heart in the room.
It wasn't just a speech. It was a reminder of why we do what we do here at Northern Academy.
He spoke about the 4 PILLARS of a truly educated person — not just someone who passes exams, but someone who grows into a complete, sincere, and courageous human being: 📖 Knowledge — the courage to face intellectual challenges head-on 🔍 Attention to Detail — valuing the small things that shape who we become 🌟 Character — not just talked about, but lived every single day 💪 Ownership — taking the wheel of your own life with drive and sincerity
And one moment that truly said it all? At Northern Academy, our lockers have no locks — and that's not a coincidence. That's character in action.
To our 8th graders moving into High School, and our Seniors stepping into college and beyond — this night was for you. You are not just students. You are becoming remarkable human beings.
🎥 Please watch Dr. Fitzgerald's full speech in the video below — we promise it's worth every minute.
💙 Congratulations to all our graduates and their families. We are so proud of you.
All right, thank you everybody.
We're here to celebrate our students
who are transitioning tonight.
We have students transitioning
from middle school into high school,
and of course, our students transitioning
away from their high school life
into college, work, and all these other challenges
that await for them.
So this is also a time of praise
because all celebration comes with praise.
It's very easy to see that we do have the best students.
We have the best families.
I've worked with students at every single grade possible,
from kindergarten all the way up to students
who are working on their master's degrees in college.
And we have, I can say truly, the best students,
the best families, the best teachers
right here at Northern Academy.
One of the things that set them apart
is when they're in front of hardship,
they're fearless in front of it.
We can talk about this all the time,
but you actually have to be able to do it.
And if you take any of our students aside
and you ask them, what does it mean
to be in front of hardship?
And they'll tell you it's about overcoming it
and how to do that with an upright heart.
And this is true of all of our students.
With our students, it's about helping them become educated.
There are four keys to becoming a truly educated person.
And I emphasize the word truly
because that's what makes us most true.
What does it mean to be a true person in the world?
It's actually about not just being a student,
but being a true human being.
It's not about just going to school
and checking off our boxes,
but becoming a true person in our heart.
And that's what we're here to emphasize tonight
with our middle school students transitioning
and our high school students, our seniors,
transitioning to the next phase of their life.
The first thing of a truly educated person
is of course their knowledge.
But I don't just mean knowledge
in that we're going to history class and our math class
and our literature class and our science class,
but really that we're facing intellectual hardships
and overcoming them.
This is about having the whole feast
of the achievements of human history put in front of us
and we connect ourselves to them.
Not just as rote pieces of information,
but that we ourselves are part of that great conversation
of which all of our students are.
So the first one is knowledge,
but it's more like intellectual fearlessness.
The second one is attention to detail.
And it's easy to use this as a cliche.
I have attention to detail,
but it's actually much more than that.
These students on one side have spent a year
and many, many years before this scheduling,
organizing, setting goals,
working through conflicts and resolving them.
It's all these sorts of things,
but much more specifically,
it's how do I take these small pieces that I'm involved with
and blend them into my whole being.
Attention to detail means I'm taking the small parts
of my life and valuing them so much
that I'm becoming more whole from them.
That's what we mean by attention to detail.
So we have knowledge, attention to detail,
and of course the third one, having an exemplary character.
It's easy to talk about this,
but actually, like I said,
I've worked with students in many different environments
and our students and our families
are the sweetest, gentlest people that there are.
They're true in that way.
One of the great examples of this,
despite some of the missteps that happen
and small little mistakes
that have to be corrected here and there,
one of the great things about Northern Academy
is we have lockers with no locks.
That's incredible.
And there could be many different perspectives on this,
but they're called lockers.
They're supposed to be locked and yet ours are not.
And now, despite any missteps that have happened,
that's remarkable.
I think it's actually hard to understand
just how remarkable that is,
that you can be in a school of several hundred people,
of nearly 200 people from top to bottom,
and we have very minimal problems.
That's wonderful.
So character, not just saying it, but living it.
And then finally, when you have these three
and they all come together,
we can only call it ownership.
This is where we expect you,
we demand you to be the master of your life,
to own your life like it's the most precious thing there is.
It's to have sincerity,
to interact with all the other humans in your life
in a real sincere way.
That's what it means to have ownership.
Determination, drive, will,
knowing what it is that you want to achieve
and setting in motion the steps to get there.
You have to overcome a tremendous amount to do that.
And our students are clearly doing that.
They're doing it as good as it can possibly be done.
It's remarkable.
So here we are, we come together
and all of these steps, the knowledge,
the attention to detail, the character, the ownership,
and they are true human beings.
Not just students, they're born people
and they're becoming fulfilled and complete people.
Successful, thoughtful, intelligent, interesting.
This is the end goal of all of our students
that we want them to be,
but even better, it's what they are.
And this is a perfect testament to it tonight.
So thank you all.
