After careful consideration, the class speaker for the Skyline 2025 graduating class has been selected: Owen McKelvey (‘25…obviously) will deliver the student speech June 2nd at Eastern Michigan University, during Skyline’s graduation ceremony.
“I’m a little nervous,” says McKelvey. “I think I’m a pretty good public speaker, though, so I’m not too scared. I took a little bit of time writing out the essay, and I’m happy I won.”
It’s a daunting task: how do you accurately represent a class of more than 300 individuals with one speech? McKelvey said he will emphasize “the community aspects. At graduation you can see the full speech, but relationships in the community built around is much more important than any individual achievement. In five years, you’re not going to remember getting an A, you’re going to remember the friends you had.”
McKelvey faced several challenges while writing. “I was here looking up other speeches, I’m like ‘Damn. These guys are really, really, good. They are really prepared writers.’ But I realized these are just other people. They’ve sat in a classroom for years and years and years, and they’re just other class speakers.” McKelvey decided to submit an entry for the speech anyway.
The selection process consisted of school staff ranking anonymous speeches. The highest average scored speeches were sent to school administrators and a final decision was made.
McKelvey is currently committed to the University of Michigan LSA, where he hopes to transfer to the School of Naval Architecture and Marine Engineering to study naval architecture. “I’m hoping to hear back from the Naval Academy soon, where if offered an appointment I will attend. I’d study naval architecture there as well.”
During his time at Skyline, McKelvey was a dedicated member of the Skyline swim team. “My favorite part about the swim team were the days when everyone was clicking and we were crushing a set,” McKelvey says. “There are days when the team as a whole is really going for it, and I love to see that.”
McKelvey also swam for the Club Wolverine team for the past four years, “a community of people who ‘get after it’. It doesn’t matter if it’s a morning practice or end of season taper day, those days when we would crush a set [were] pretty common.”
Kelvey says that the most important thing he got from Skyline was definitely that “I grew up. I learned to…become a better people-person.”
