美国南加大2019届毕业典礼 优秀学生代表演讲

当地时间5月10日，美国南加利福尼亚大学（University of Southern California）举行2019届毕业典礼。越南难民后裔Ivana Giang作为优秀学生代表发表了演讲。

Valedictorian Ivana Giang channels her refugee family story to combat global education inequality

Growing up around beauty salons in suburbs of Ohio, Ivana Giang saw two worlds.

She would be surrounded by other Vietnamese women doing hair and nails, including her mom and aunts, who owned the shops. She often worked the register or swept floors to help out. And then go off to study, working for the higher education her mom and aunts dreamed of.

表示“美容院”，英文解释为“a place where you can receive treatments for your skin, hair, nails etc to make you look more attractive”，类似的还可以说：beauty parlour/beauty shop。

The child of Vietnamese refugees, Giang knew what her parents endured to get to the U.S. Her dad, now an engineer for General Electric, was forced to leave the country at age 15 by himself by boat. He was rescued by Dutch sailors and raised in the Netherlands before settling in the U.S., where he met her mom at a Vietnamese Catholic church in Columbus. Her mom had arrived just a few years after him, escaping Vietnam where her father — Giang’s grandfather — had been a prisoner of war. She supported the family, sewing car seats in a Honda factory, while Giang’s father got citizenship while studying at The Ohio State University.

“She actually did enroll in community college in Columbus but she had to drop out because she was pregnant with me,” Giang said. “I do all this for her.”

USC 2019 valedictorian rallies against inequality

Giang, the 2019 valedictorian, knows the importance of access to education. Even though her high school accomplishments seemed to check every box — from leading the school magazine, student government and Relay For Life, to the volleyball team — she wouldn't have made it to USC without a full scholarship because financially, it would be impossible.

/ˌvælɪdɪkˈtɔːrɪən/ 表示“致告别词的毕业生代表（通常为成绩最优秀者）”，英文解释为“the student who has received the best marks all the way through school, and who usually makes a speech at the graduation ceremony”。

没有查到具体含义，Urban Dictionary中有一个相关短语，check the box英文解释为：A phrase which means to complete a task to the barest minimum standard, and subsequently cease working. At this point one may check off the box on a task list or matrix.

While at USC, she’s made it her mission to advocate against the disparities in educational resources that she herself faced, whether it’s around the world or in her own backyard. And the importance of representation, remembering being one of only a few Asian American students in her high school class of 600.

表示“（尤指不公正的）不同，差异”，英文解释为“a difference between two or more things, especially an unfair one”，如：a disparity between the rates of pay for men and women 男性与女性在工资水平上的差异。

反义词：parity

Her junior year, during her semester abroad in Nicaragua, she reported on the impact of NGOs that build schools in the rural communities. While they provide access to education, she found the work done by American tourists was low-skill and could have easily been supplied by local workers, disrupting the local economy. In a country that has experienced historical intervention by the U.S., it nailed down the importance of listening — which is something that’s become a common thread in her work and the focus of her global studies honors thesis.

1) 表示“弄清”，英文解释为“If you nail down something unknown or uncertain, you find out exactly what it is.”举个🌰：

It would be useful if you could nail down the source of this tension.

如果你能弄清这种紧张情绪的根源，会是有用的。

1) 表示“最终确定，对…作出定论”，英文解释为“to reach a final and definite agreement or decision about something” ，如：to nail down the details of an agreement 要把协议的所有细节都确定下来。

“It’s about respecting the narratives of people who have been disempowered throughout history,” Giang said. “It’s about listening to what they have to say — making sure they have the tools and resources to decide for themselves how they want to live as a community.”

表示“故事；叙事”，英文解释为“A narrative is a story or an account of a series of events.”如：a fast-moving narrative 一个快节奏的叙事。

From school integration to racial resegregation, Giang wants to make an impact studying both global studies at the USC Dornsife College of Letters, Arts and Sciences and public policy at the USC Price School of Public Policy, she wanted to put her NGO experience to use with an understanding of U.S. politics.

表示“（不同种族、性别、宗教的）分开，隔离”，英文解释为“when people of different races, sexes, or religions are kept apart so that they live, work, or study separately”，racial segregation 种族隔离。

After Nicaragua, she got a brief break before spending the summer interning for Sen. Dianne Feinstein on a Leonard D. Schaeffer Fellowship. On Capitol Hill, she had the chance to meet with researchers studying school integration. And in the weeks after President Donald Trump rescinded Obama-era affirmative action guidelines for universities, she asked Education Secretary Betsy DeVos what her office planned to do about rising racial resegregation in public schools.

表示“废除；取消；撤销”，英文解释为“to officially end a law, or change a decision or agreement”举个🌰：

He does not have the authority to rescind the ruling.

他无权撤销这项裁决。

The experience led her to research the problem with USC sociologist Ann Owens, culling federal data from nearly 30 years for her public policy senior thesis.

表示“采集”，英文解释为“If items or ideas are culled from a particular source or number of sources, they are taken and gathered together.”举个🌰：

All this, needless to say, had been culled second-hand from radio reports.

不必说，这一切都是从无线电广播报道中搜集来的第二手信息。

While she’s looked at these issues from the national and international perspective, she’s made an impact locally on campus as well. She was the Undergraduate Student Government’s first chief diversity officer, a position co-held and co-created sophomore year while she was also assistant director of the diversity affairs committee. During her tenure, she helped develop the curriculum for a class in occupational therapy called Thrive that was aimed at student wellbeing. Her input was critical in conversations around culture and respect on campus.

表示“（重要职位的）任期”，英文解释为“the period of time when someone has an important job formal”举个🌰：

The company has doubled in value during his tenure.

在他的任期内，公司的市值翻了一番。

Over the past four years, she’s also mentored at South L.A. schools, where the majority of students are black or Latino, the latter many of whom were English learners from immigrant families.

“I connect with that narrative as someone who also has immigrant parents,” she said.

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「持续行动第五年，LR是怎么做到的？」