Ideas for a Salutatorian Graduation Speech

Consider your selection to speak at graduation an honor and a reflection of your hard work.

Graduation gives you as salutatorian a stage to showcase your talent as a public speaker, your creativity in choosing a topic, and a good practice venue for future public speeches. There are generally several speakers at commencement, each with a given time limit. With a little planning and careful topic selection, you should have no problems filling your allotted time slot in an informative and entertaining manner that will impress your peers and family.

College Major

As salutatorian, you may be surprised at how many of your classmates look up to you. They are probably genuinely interested in your views, particularly when it comes to choices for college. One of the most stressful choices can be choosing a college major -- whether a student possesses a self-imposed belief that she should choose a major prior to enrolling, or is getting outside pressure from family. Present your opinion and find support for that opinion by interviewing career counselors, current students or college graduates. If, after your own research, your opinion changed, that can be a good point to make in the speech: sometimes we change our minds, and lives still turn out OK.

Volunteering

Motivating others to volunteer is a worthwhile speech topic.

Volunteering can provide young adults with valuable real-life experience in many ways. You can develop self-confidence, work experience, empathy and worthwhile connections that will benefit you for the rest of your life. If you did not volunteer during your school career, you can still speak on how you wish you would have, or that you will be doing volunteering before or during college. Research local opportunities, or speak about volunteer "tourism" programs that can send students around the world. There is also the iconic volunteer job that may resonate with parents in the audience: the Peace Corps.

Owning Your Decisions

You and your peers will begin a new phase of responsibility. You will adjust to making decisions without adults looking over your shoulder, taking full responsibility when there are unexpected outcomes. You will likely experience just as much peer pressure, and may even experience increased pressure from your parents. Perhaps they want to influence your college choice or area of study, specifying that financial support will be tied to their wishes. Explore the consequences of such choices, perhaps taking your peers through "worst possible scenarios" to show them they have more power and ability to make decisions than perhaps they believe.

Your Speech!

How you prepared for your own speech is a worthy topic.

Planning your salutatorian speech is a major event thus far in your life, and how you have planned and practiced for that event is a topic worth noting and sharing. Everyone likes to view a little humility in people with great achievements; remind your peers that being a salutatorian does not naturally mean you have experience speaking, or feel comfortable doing so. Share honestly about your fears, the methods you used in choosing a topic, how funny you felt practicing in front of a mirror, or in front of your dog, or how your parents gave you looks of disapproval when you wanted to share a humorous family anecdote. Relate something you have learned about yourself, and how you will translate that to future scenarios.