Senior speeches are back in person for the 2021-22 school year after being online for all of last year. For some people, this is exciting, and for others, this is not a change-back they were looking forward to. Senior speeches at Blake are speeches given by all seniors throughout the year on topics that the speaker cares about and wants to educate others about.

With senior speeches being online all of last year, seniors giving the speeches didn’t really have an audience to talk to, while other students watching could be more relaxed than usual. As first senior speech giver this school year Jay Gulati ‘22 puts it, “when you’re online, it just doesn’t captivate you that much.”

Now that senior speeches are back in the JNA in person, speakers can see their audience actively listening, while students all have to be present in the JNA, listening to the speeches. Junior Matthew Chen ‘23 states “it’s more interesting, being able to see everybody else’s reactions [to the speech].” So, the impact of the senior speeches being back in person this year has really been felt throughout the student body, whether it’s the students having to pay more attention than when they were online, or the seniors feeling the energy in the JNA and attention of the other students while giving their meaningful speeches.