It was a day of celebration but also mourning as students and staff remembered Johnetta Overton, who was killed in a car accident just after completing her junior year last May.

“In her absence, the rooms at school seem a little duller,” said friend Julia Niemi just before Overton’s family was presented with an honorary diploma. Graduates wore silver ribbons pinned to their left shoulder in Overton’s honor.

The keynote speech, titled “Preparing Yourself for an Unsparing Global Economy,” was delivered by James Johnson, a professor at UNC-Chapel Hill and Urban Investment Strategies Center at UNC.

Johnson spoke to graduates about personal branding and how to make themselves more marketable in a changing economy.

“None of us can assume good-paying American jobs will be available in the future,” Johnson said.

Student speaker John Nelson talked to his classmates on the difference between wishes, hopes and dreams and told his peers to “Dream with conviction, no matter what the obstacles are.”

Graduate Ben Goldhaber didn’t shy away from puns and cliches in his own speech to his class.

“Our class is going to change the world. I hate to be cliche, but it’s true,” Goldhaber said, his cap’s tassel bouncing and shaking with every bob of his head. “I can’t imagine any of the people sitting in this room leading mediocre lives because none of them have been mediocre in high school. This energy ... I can’t define it but I’ve felt it.”