Graduation Speech: Secret to Success, Pt. 2

 Verda Tetteh. Remember that name. Verda Tetteh is near the top of my ‘most likely to know success in her life’. She unlocked the secret as a high school senior.

 Ms. Tetteh is a child of an immigrant family, from Ghana. She worked her way through the pandemic year at a grocery store while achieving the highest of academic honors at her school. Oh, by the way, she also received admission to Harvard. Yet, admirable as are these achievements, the part of Ms. Tetteh’s character that impresses me most is what she did with the $40,000.00 award from her school for her excellent record.

 After listening to the graduation day speeches about ‘being selfless and being bold’, she made an unscheduled trip back to the graduation day microphone.  She proceeded to ask that the school change the game for someone else’s life by taking back her $40,000.00 award and granting it to someone in greater economic need.

 One news outlet reported her remarks and what followed: “’I am so very grateful for this, but I also know that I am not the one who needs this the most,’ she said. Out on the grass, her classmates rose from their folding chairs to cheer. It was her second standing ovation that day.”  (https://www.washingtonpost.com/education/2021/06/08/verda-tetteh-scholarship-graduation/)

 I would have been one of those rising to cheer her too. Ms. Tetteh’s selfless and bold act, one could argue, was poor personal financial planning. But it is great life-planning, learning as a young adult that keeping what we need while being generous with that we do not need, or that someone else needs more.

 As Leslie Barnor, Verda’s stepfather explained, “’We are a Christian family….We believe we don’t need to have so much before you give to others.’” That’s the secret, friends.

 I don’t know what God has in mind for Ms. Tetteh’s path going forward, but I hope her story will be one that her generation will repeat often and widely.  The future of our society is much brighter because of visionary immigrants like Ms. Tetteh, people who truly understand that making someone else’s dream possible is the secret to success in life.