The message of ordinary heroism that ran through Fernley High School’s commencement ceremony last Friday night became literal at the close of the ceremony, when the Foo Fighters song "My Hero" began playing over the stadium speakers after Principal Ryan Cross declared the Class of 2026 dismissed.
This year’s graduating class includes 30 members who received advanced diplomas, 58 who received college and career-ready diplomas and 90 potential recipients of the Millennium Scholarship. There were 11 members of the National Honor Society, two Magna Cum Laude graduates and 17 Summa Cum Laude graduates.
The idea that ordinary people become heroic by pushing through challenges and showing up for one another anchored all three student speeches.
Student Body President Jackson Hohnholz tied his remarks to the song, specifically the lyric, "Don’t the best of them bleed it out while the rest of them peter out."
Hohnholz recalled a car ride with his mother during his freshman year when the song came on. She told him it was her favorite Foo Fighters song because it reminded her of high school. He said when he got home and listened closely to the lyrics, he realized their meaning.
"I challenge you to do one thing, and that is to be a hero," Hohnholz said. "Because the true heroes in life aren’t the people who are extraordinary, but the ordinary people who refuse to peter out, even when it is the most difficult."
Salutatorian Abby Herrington followed by framing graduation as growth rather than achievement.
"Over the last four years, we've learned so much more than what was written in our textbooks," Herrington said. "We’ve learned how to adapt when things don’t go according to plan. We’ve learned how to overcome challenges. We've learned how to keep moving forward, even when things get difficult."
Herrington told the graduates she is grateful for the opportunities Fernley High School provides students. For her, she said, that included earning her Associate of Science degree and becoming a Certified Nursing Assistant while still in high school.
"It gave us chances to explore interests, build confidence and take meaningful steps toward our futures before we ever walked across the stage," she said.
Herrington said everyone has encountered someone who questioned their abilities, whether it was another person or their own inner voice.
"Success doesn't belong only to the people who have everything figured out. If that were true, none of us would be here today," she said. "Success belongs to the people who keep going, even when they're uncertain. It belongs to the people who get knocked down and stand back up. It belongs to the people who choose not to let setbacks define them."
She reminded students that their potential is not determined by the opinions of others.
"Don't let fear decide what you're capable of," Herrington said. "Don't let failure convince you to quit, and don't let someone else's limitations become your own."
She ended her speech with a question.
"If you stop listening to every voice that told you what you couldn't do, what would you be brave enough to become?" she asked. "Congratulations, Class of 2026. I can't wait to see where your answers take you."
Valedictorian Bobby Woolsey took that idea a step further, reminding graduates that everyone is living life for the first time.
"As we do anything for the first time, we're bound to make a couple of mistakes, so as you go forward, try not to be too hard on yourself or others," he said. "I just feel that it's important to keep the fact in mind that we're all new to this."
He also told them not to let people talk down to them or force them to abandon their way of thinking.
"If they were so much better than you as they suggest, why are they in the same room as you?" he asked. "Why are they not in some place you can't even comprehend?"
Woolsey said self-doubt is the foremost reason people do not accomplish what they set out to do.
"All of us are capable of more than we may think, and we can achieve goals that we haven't even thought of yet," he said. "We just have to get there."
He urged graduates to slow down, leave a little early, take the scenic route to their destination and surround themselves with people who want to see them succeed.
"Just because somebody wasn't there on the first day doesn't mean they can't be a Day One," he said. "And the opposite is obviously true. Just because someone has been in your atmosphere for a good amount of time doesn't mean they have the right to pollute your mind with ideas that are going to lead you both to ruin."
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