Ryann Moelis: Lynbrook High School salutatorian

Ryann Moelis has kept herself busy during her years at school. In that time, she has worked in multiple roles on the school’s newspaper, played on the school’s tennis team, been active in the school’s foreign language program and served as president of the National Honor Society.

As she looks back on those four years, however, she said that she sometimes thinks she should have taken more time to stop and smell the roses.

“I feel like I took school too seriously, and maybe I would tell others to make sure they take a deep breath and enjoy themselves,” Ryann said. She thinks fondly of her early days at the school, when she was convinced her life would revolve around tennis, as she hoped to compete at high levels in the sport.

She laughed as she thought of how her path changed. She still played on the team, she said, but changed her focus, exploring her love of language. She took both French and Spanish, leading co-curricular clubs on the subjects and spending time with a tutor outside of school in order to accelerate her learning.

Ryann also rose through the ranks of Horizon, the school’s newspaper. She began as a reporter in her freshman year before eventually serving as news editor, managing editor and, finally, editor-in-chief. She had a similar rise though the ranks of the National Honor Society, of which she is now president, and said she would not trade her time in any of those clubs.

“Moving forward, there are so many things that are open to me, that aren’t open to other people, because I put in those hours,” she said. “Every hour that I spent in that Horizon office means something.”

Ryann is the daughter of Larry and Sharon Moelis. She will attend the University of Virginia in the fall, and hopes to study public health, aiming at a future career in the international healthcare industry. In her speech to her graduating class, she said she plans to tell her classmates to make sure that no matter what their path in life, to always have the courage of their convictions.

“Going forward in life there are hard choices you’re going have to make, regardless of what you choose,” she said. “You don’t have to go a certain way or do a certain thing, but you shouldn’t ever be neutral…as long as you do something and you stand for something, you’re good.”