Baccalaureate 2023 at IGM

It all started on a sunny June day eight years ago.
There stood a group of very cute, excited and bright-eyed fourth graders in our schoolyard. They held in their hands a self-labeled piece of paper with their wish for the start at their new school, our Gymnasium. They were supposed to let this wish list rise into the sky attached to a colorful balloon. One balloon flew into the sky sooner, Marek's. I will never forget his frightened face when he did that. And I thought to myself: you have to pay special attention to this little scatterbrained blond.

Today, 8 years later, he towers over his teachers in height, is still blond, scatterbrained, but in all the time that has passed, like all his classmates, has developed a personality all his own. And we teachers, our entire team, have played a part in this.
Back to the original picture: sun, schoolyard, sweaty hands, balloon: whether the high school graduates today can still remember what was written on their note: Dear teachers? Long breaks? Time to play soccer? That it wouldn't be so hard? Good lunch? Finishing school on time?

Suppose you were to release a wishing balloon into the sky again today. What would be on the note this time? Because one thing is new: the experience of having a high school diploma in your pocket! I hope something forward-looking, positive, because what you think is possible for yourself manifests itself and is the seed for your own success.
I already see today's high school graduates as future prosecutors, music-producing computer scientists, high school teachers, police officers, circumnavigators, elementary school teachers, psychologists, event managers, social workers and social workers, tax professionals, insurance brokers, pilots, civil servants in the social security system ... . As diverse as our society is, as different and interesting are the study and career aspirations.
I wish you from the bottom of my heart that they continue to grow - in their personality - see supposed difficulties as opportunities for their growth.

They have given us teachers a lot as well, not only staplers left lying around, performance checks or exams in the corners of window stacks, new terms from youth language or an insight into their music. Their critical view of the small and big world, their ideas and wishes spur us to rethink the tried and true in order to do good justice to the following grades, as they are our future.
This challenge is the beauty of the teaching profession and automatically keeps us young.
Each of our students will be remembered in her and his own special way.
"You have a place in my heart."