Burbank — It isn’t often a cougar offers advice to a pack of coyotes.

But the 58 graduates of Columbia High School in Burbank heard sage words on Friday not just from any cougar, but the “Voice of the Cougs” himself.

Glenn Johnson, who has been the announcer for the Washington State University football and men’s basketball games for 33 years, told the graduating seniors to remember that coyotes — the school’s mascot — have great traits: keen vision, adaptability and cleverness.

Those traits would serve them well as they journey into the adult world, he said.

“I wish for all of you to have those traits of a coyote until you’re 100 years old,” Johnson said.

Salutatorian Kaitlin Cobb noted in her speech that adulthood itself is a journey rather than a destination.

“This isn’t the end,” she told her classmates. “It’s a single point in a journey we’ll be traveling our entire lives.”

Valedictorian Emily Noyes encouraged her classmates to embody an additional trait — understanding.

She said that’s the most fundamental part of being human.

“I hope we always try to understand our friends and family, and people we may never meet,” Noyes said.

Understanding is something she learned from the teachers, friends and family members who influenced her, Noyes said.

“Teachers are not the only ones who teach us,” she said as she thanked the people who guided her. “Without all of you, I wouldn’t be here wearing this dorky hat.”