RE: my (former) school district peeps:

If I may get (somewhat) personal here, I would like to send a request out to all of the approximately 850 students with whom I graduated late last June: Like me, you're probably officially starting your post K-12 lives this week, after a summer that was (if it was anything like mine) probably filled with all kinds of emotions, especially sadness, nostalgia, frustration (mostly college/university-related), & even a few get-togethers with your people most likely for the last time for the foreseeable future..... If you don't mind letting me remind you of some stats here, I'll gladly show you a few of those! 1: 44% of you will be attending 4-year schools, 2: 35% of you will be attending 2-year schools, 3: 18% will be entering the workforce straight away, 4: Quite a few of you decided to attend community colleges & trade schools, which I won't hold against those of you who chose that path, but I must warn you of this: you most likely won't be graduating in 4 years, assuming you do decide to move on to a university once you finish your studies at whichever C.C./trade school you choose! 5: $1,712,320 worth of 1-year grants/scholarships & $6,186,271 worth of 4-year grants/scholarships were awarded this past school year simply because you people worked your you-know-whats off to obtain those grants & scholarships! I know I just reiterated a bunch of stats, but I'm not concerned about those stats the most; nope, I'm encouraged the most by the fact that the vast majority of you decided to @ least start your college years within this state! Among the N.J. colleges & universities represented by you people: NJCU, TCNJ, FDU, MSU, Rutgers (all 3 campuses!), Rowan, Rider, Kean, & many of our community colleges, among others..... Obviously, not all of you decided to remain with the rest of us here in N.J., so among those colleges & universities, I've noticed the following represented by @ least 1 of you people: NYU, Columbia, Pace, UPenn, Penn State, UConn, Syracuse, Pittsburgh, RPI, Fairfield, Lehigh, Hofstra, Maryland, & Delaware, among others, & those are just some of the neighboring states represented by you people! My point in mentioning all of your choices, however, is this: I'm glad most of you people decided to attend colleges/universities either in this state or in neighboring states, since I believe that shows your commitment to both your college/university as well as your continued commitment to your school district..... Now that I've mentioned all of that, I'd like to issue a (sort of) challenge to all of you to re-visit this district @ least once during the fall, a few times in January (if you end up having the majority of that month off), @ least once during the spring semester, & during June (if you get any chances during that month)! I already decided my plans during the near future, so I might as well make the same request of you people as I made to myself earlier this summer in order to @ least let you people know that I hope you people remain somewhat committed to our school district even after graduation!