As you know my daughter Sam is graduating from High School this year. The final year of high school is tough, plus a big transition from being regarded as a kid to that of an adult.

Some might say that this year is also one of the most emotionally stressful years of their young lives, given the pressure to meet the now almost impossibly high University entrance criteria.

Case in point… Early in the school year she had decided to target two potential subjects for her University studies. Her first choice was to study Engineering and her second was Mathematics.

She’s worked incredibly hard over the past three years, including summer schools to build her knowledge and acumen in the Maths and Sciences domain. Her grade average is sitting at a solid 94%.

Not sure about you, but I was never the student who could even dream of a 90% mark in any subject let alone an average mark across all her subjects.

Although she didn’t feel super confident about her chances of getting into Engineering I thought it was just her modesty that was preventing her from seeing the big picture.

Well, wasn’t I taken aback when she was only waitlisted for Engineering…

I mean wow! A 94% doesn’t get you a placement? What do you need to get a place these days? To say I was stunned is literally the understatement of the modern world! Seriously.

However, all was not lost. Not by a long way. In fact, if you believe in fate (which I do…hey, that’s your outside voice! ๐Ÿ™‚ then things turned out exactly as they were supposed to on a couple of fronts.

In fact, in the end she had three University offers, the first was to study Engineering at Dalhousie University in Halifax (too far away), the second was an offer to study Mathematics at McGill in Montreal (decidedly too close to Zach and being in his shadow) or the one that she really wanted if she didn’t get into Engineering at Queens was to study Mathematics at the University of Waterloo.

The University of Waterloo co-op program has a world class reputation, not to mention that it’s my ex’s alma mater (yes, she also studied mathematics) so everyone is ecstatic with her choice of University.

By now you can tell that Sam loves math and statistics so she was super happy and accepted their offer smiling all the way!

I’m happy that she’s happy!

So this all transpired late last week, but the best was yet to come.

I received an excited text from Sam on Tuesday to say that she’d been chosen as Valedictorian for her graduating class. Wow, such an amazing feat, especially given that she has a class of 120 smart and accomplished girls…so the competition is fierce as you can imagine. ๐Ÿ™‚

As you can image she was absolutely thrilled, as was I.

What an honour! And just one more to her already overflowing list of accomplishments. Just incredible!

Yes, all week I’ve been bursting with pride, and can’t wait to hear her speech at graduation.

In Australia there is no concept of Valedictorian. I guess we call it being the Dux of your class or highest ranked student.

Here in Canada its that plus a little more, in that you’re selected by your peers as the best person to represent them at graduation, to speak on their behalf if you will. To be considered you need to have one of the highest academic records in the class as be well rounded in all aspects of school life.

During Sam’s eight years at the school she’s been Athlete of the year, played in the school band for a number of years, competed at Model UN events in both Toronto and Montreal and been elected to lead Innovation portfolio as part of her head prefect role this past year.

Just incredible accomplishments!

Then when you layer in her representing Canada at the Maccabi games in U18 soccer in 2017, and winning a bronze medal. Not to mention playing Women’s Premier league soccer at the Provincial level and last year winning the Dean’s Leadership Award for her summer school program at Columbia University in New York you get a glimpse of the well rounded and amazing young woman I’m lucky enough to call my daughter.

She’s such a quadruple threat – she’s smart, athletic, kind and beautiful!

All I know is that she has the world at her feet and that the sky is the absolute limit for her in anything she chooses in life.

I’m so proud of her!

And can’t wait to be in the front row at her graduation to hear her speech, it’s going to be awesome… ๐Ÿ™‚