Pope High School led off a week-long schedule of Cobb County School District graduations on Monday night, and its Class of 2026 had much to celebrate.
As seniors listened during commencement exercises at the KSU Convocation Center, they were told by Principal Matthew Bradford that they set some school records along the way, especially when it came to community service.
He said that this class exemplified the “characteristics of greatness” that included excellence, respect, integrity and toughness.
Among the notables were 17,000 hours of community service, “the most in school history,” as well as raising more than $25,000 for cancer research in the name of former Pope student Matt Hobby.
Pope students also raised $40,000 as part of its Shop With a Greyhound program to assist Brumby Elementary School students during the holidays.
As far as class legacies go, Bradford said, “you have not just met” such a high standard, “you have surpassed it.”
Nearly a half of Pope’s seniors graduated with honors, and its college-bound graduates have accrued more than $12.5 million in scholarship assistance, excluding the Georgia HOPE program.
“Wherever your journey takes you, know that your Pope family will always be behind you,” Bradford said.
The student speakers included valedictorian Kenneth Kim, who will be attending Duke University, and salutatorian Malachy O’Connor, who is bound for Georgia Tech.
Cobb Board of Education member John Cristadoro urged all the graduates to become influencers, not on social media, but in their communities and with people in their lives on a daily basis.
He cited a figure that some people could influence more than 80,000 others—enough to fill a football stadium—during the course of their lives, and that as they will be remembered at the end of their lives, to consider “what the reaction will be.
“Make those moments of influence count,” Cristadoro said. “Leave every situation better than when you found it.”
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