Who are these people, the last high school graduates of the 20th century? Are they as violent and as ill-educated as the media so often laments? Did hey, as we seem to remember we did, read Shakespeare and Dickens, or were they forever planted in front of the almighty tube -- and later, the computer?

Where will they take us in the decades ahead as they come of age and assume the positions of power?

We let eight young Rhode Islanders speak for themselves recently. They are going to Harvard, to Gallaudet, to Johnson & Wales and straight into the work force. They are articulate, and they have strong opinions -- about themselves and about their generation.

Here's a sampling of the Class of 1999:

Educating people when they are young is the key to fighting discrimination, Sendy Mojica wrote in a recent award-winning essay.

She would start in kindergarten, teaching children about different races and countries: their religion, food and people.

"Children need a foundation, and studying different cultures will help them become comfortable in a diversified environment," Mojica wrote.

"In high school, I would make a class in racism a requirement. Here, they would study about racism and how it has affected our country. Students would also be required to study about the Holocaust, slavery, Native Americans and others. Here, they would hear about all of the atrocities that have happened because of racism.

"This class will be a little harsh for them, but it will teach them reality."

Mojica, a senior at Hanley Career and Technical School, in Providence, won a $1,000 scholarship from the Providence Human Relations Commission for her essay on discrimination.

Mojica, 18, moved to Providence from the Dominican Republic when she was 10. She and her parents live in an apartment in South Providence.

"They moved because they didn't want me to go to school over there, because they want me to get a better living," Mojica says. "They wanted me to go to college."

Mojica says she worries about a lot of her peers in Providence, youngsters into mischief and worse.

"Kids are having kids, and they don't pay attention as much because they want to lead their own lives. They don't know what their kids are doing. They need to work with their kids, and tell them what's right and what's wrong. Sometimes they think their kids are born knowing what's right and wrong. And they aren't."

Mojica, who likes to read Shakespeare and watch Mad About You, also is serious about volunteer work -- at the West End Community Center, the Salvation Army, the youth council at the Volunteer Center.

She hopes the Hanley folks remember her as someone who "helped anybody who wants to talk or needs help. I'm always there for anybody, even if I don't know that person. If I see someone struggling, I give them my number and say, 'Call me.'"

Mojica will continue to live at home when she enrolls at Johnson & Wales University in the fall. She plans to study Web management, a "fairly new program about the Internet and Web page design."

"People think if you go to Hanley, you don't go to college," Mojica says. "But we do. It's hard when you don't have an education. That's what motivated me."

(c) 1999, The Providence Journal Company