At a time when graduation ceremonies have become platforms for protest and polarization—especially around Israel—an 18-year-old Jewish student in Sacramento chose a different path: one of inspiration and moral courage.

Graduation season is often filled with joy, relief, and pride. Yet this year, the spotlight has often shifted from celebration to controversy. More and more, student commencement speeches have become stages for political posturing, nowhere more visible than at MIT, where class president Megha Vemuri recently used her address to single out Israel for condemnation.

Her remarks were part of a troubling trend this spring, as multiple graduation speeches have been hijacked to harshly single out Israel, turning moments of celebration into ones that have alienated Jewish students and their families.

But contrast that with a quieter, more powerful gesture made thousands of miles away by an 18-year-old high school senior in Sacramento.

Vanessa Huckleby, the only Jewish student in her graduating class at Natomas Homeschool Alliance, asked for the opportunity to sing at her school’s commencement ceremony. She told the principal she would like to perform an Italian aria, and a Hebrew song.

That song was Acheinu, a relatively obscure prayer recited during weekday services at a synagogue, usually after the reading of the Torah. Since October 7, 2023, the musical rendition of the prayer composed by Abie Rotenberg, has become a global anthem of solidarity and grief, sung in synagogues, at rallies, and outside........

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