Looking into tomorrow

Katie Orear gave the valedictory address at the graduation ceremony at the Hume High School Saturday, May 15. Orear was kept busy when not speaking working to get the senior slide show going, a technical glitch prompted several false starts and the program proceeded while waiting for the slides to begin. Fourteen students graduated in the class of 2010. --Photos by Steve Moyer/Daily Mail

Salutatorian Matthew Yarick, spoke briefly during the graduation ceremony Saturday, May 15, at Hume High School. Teacher Kenneth Wheeler was the main speaker and told of his first meeting with the class of 2010. "I've been here now five years," Wheeler said. "When I started they said, 'We want you to teach high school social science and junior high school social science.' I said, 'OK,' so the first day I walk in and there are 12 scrawny, well, 11 scrawny eighth graders and Zach. I sat there and said 'Well, let's see what we have to work with.' People told me they were brighter than they looked, and I hoped they were," he joked. The audience appreciated Wheeler's humor and drowned him out several times with their laughter, especially when he told of his extra-curricular employment. "They came and said, 'Oh, by the way, we also want you to coach junior high basketball.' I said, 'What do I have,' and they said, 'We don't know.' Halfway through the season, I still didn't know what I had," Wheeler joked. Wheeler said he cares deeply for the students but "Being locked in a van with them going down (a highway with) six lanes of traffic is not something I recommend for anybody's sanity."