The future looks as bright as the weather that graced today’s celebration of the newest 13th Year Promise class at South Seattle College (WSB sponsor). That’s the program offering a free year at SSC for graduates of certain Seattle Public Schools high schools, including Chief Sealth International High School, and starting in a year, West Seattle High School. Today marked the end of orientation for the students, as they look ahead to fall-quarter classes a week from Monday. Their guest speaker in Olympic Hall was City Councilmember M. Lorena González, who found herself suddenly acting City Council President as of yesterday, and had a few words about the city leadership changes at the start of her speech:

But she spent much more of her time explaining how she fought to prove wrong those who had told her “people like me don’t go to college”:

The students also got inspiration from the 13th Year program’s leader Julius Moss:

And they heard from the college’s new interim president Peter Lortz:

(If you missed it – here’s our report on our conversation with the new president.) This year’s class is the largest in the 10-year history of the 13th Year Promise program – 150 students.