How to improve Graduations

Parent Cafe
1

<p>Seems many of use had some not so great graduations, so lets consolodate the ideas to improve them, and then we can send them off to our respect schools, in hopes that maybe the school will change something:</p>

<p>Have speeches last no more than 8 minutes each, love the valiectdictoriom speeches, but after about 4 minutes, I ususally just want you to stop</p>

<p>I would rather have you speak a bit too fast then a bit, er, really slow</p>

<p>If you insist on giving out awards to those that have helped the school, do not take 30 minutes to do it, refer back to the first point- no more than 5 minutes to introduce te “winner” and no more than 3 minutes of thank you, in total, no more than 15 minutes for those awards to non-students, no matter how they helped the school, this is NOT there day, so instead of reading their entire bio, print the darn thing on the website, we don’t care, sad to say, after 15 minutes of the guys life story</p>

<p>Do NOT tell us that you will be just opening the front doors, so we all waited 1 1/2 hours in the drizzle, just so you could then open the side doors to late comers who got the best seats</p>

<p>I like the handing out of ribbons to wave when your child is called, or standing up, those are lovely ideas, cause when you are standing you can snap a picture!!!</p>

<p>No ceremony should go on for more than 1 1/2 hours, cut stuff short, so that we aren’t all chomping at the bit to leave by the time the last kid is called up</p>

<p>And thank you for this year not putting where graduates are going to college, just merit scholarships, by school, they received, and just having a master list of schools people are going to</p>

<p>That is a great change from the past</p>

2

<p>Oops. I liked seeing where the kids are going off to school. Is there a problem with that?</p>

<p>A nice part of our graduation was that the only ‘awards’ presented were the gifts FROM the senior class: scholarships for young kids from a slum to go to school: gifts of clothing to victims of acid violence: and the graduates handed out small flower garlands to their parents.</p>

3

<p>I agree that speeches should be limited to 4-5 minutes, and also just 1 student speech, 1 principal speech, and I suppose 1 guest speaker. I like that our school does not have a Val speech. Instead, anyone can anonymously submit a speech to the English dept. by a deadline, and the best one is chosen, and then everyone finds out who wrote it, and they get to give it.</p>

<p>I also very much like seeing where kids are going to college. It is not announced at graduation, but posted in the hallway of the H.S.</p>

4

<p>Bag the guest speaker. Let the students talk but limit to 3-4 minutes. Limit adult speakers, it’s the kid’s momment. Attempt to get things rolling ontime and work to get everybody out of there quickly.</p>

5

<p>THe problem with seeing where each kid is going specifically can cause a lot of stress for some</p>

<p>“What, you AREN"T going to XYZ, oh, not enough $$” or that kind of thing</p>

<p>If you want to know, ask them</p>

<p>A general list is enough imo, having seen kids having to answer uncomfortable personal questions</p>

6

<p>Interesting, but I have never seen a list of where each graduate is going. Maybe that is because not everyone at our school is going to college?</p>

7

<p>You may be right Suzie. At our school, over 95% go on to college or CC. No-one has protested the bulletin board yet.</p>

8

<p>The inspirational speeches - I always sit there thinking (hoping) that the kids better have heard all that stuff on a regular basis because that 10 minutes goes right in one ear and out the next…</p>

9

<p>My D’s hs is graduating around 700 kids, so everything takes a really long time. The kids practically run across the stage and it’s still hours. For my older D’s gradution we just sat waiting for the 20 second run, then waited to go out to dinner afterward.
One val speech I heard was lovely. It was my cousin’s son. His whole speech was not about the future. Instead he pointed out, one by one, a great number of kids in the class for their achievements during high school. Not all were academic or sports or standard ECs. They were things like working to support their families or their landscaping jobs or other ‘mundane’ things. He honored his classmates for doing their best. A really great speech.</p>

10

<p>Our school system’s grad. ceremonies are geared for speed and efficiency.</p>

<p>No guest speaker, Class President does welcome and greetings, school chorus sings, Val. and Sal. each do a short speech. Diplomas are handed out. S1’s class of 450, took about an hour and a half start to finish.</p>

<p>We are in a large system(18-20 high sch, I think). Graduations are scheduled back to back for three consecutive days in civic large auditoriums. They run like clockwork which is good ( no long speeches) and bad (the whole thing is pretty impersonal, no time for doing anything special like a slide show or anything nostalgic).</p>

<p>My main complaint is that the large auditorium setting makes some in the audience feel they are at a sporting event or concert so they talk (to their neighbors and on cell phones) and shout at their grad. through the whole ceremony.</p>

11

<p>Our school goes one further- every graduates name along with a lit of colleges where he was accepted (a star beside the one he’s going to), which ones he got into the honors program, whether he got our state merit award and which level (75% or 100%). Personally I think it’s a bit much.</p>

12

<p>School district had a scholarship awards night with parents and school day awards sessions during the school day for other awards. Graduations are well run- separate weekday evenings for each school (suburbs use weekends- usually no conflicts for relatives with more than one to attend), 10 tickets for the arena at large seats, could try for more. Orchestra played during preceremoney seating- grads in cap and gown, one of the bands played the in/out marches, choir grads joined in their groups during the ceremony- well done music. Short forgettable speeches, all on DVD (hint-buy it), smooth getting +/- 500 grads across the stage. Waiting around for son to get his diploma and locate us afterwards was the biggest hassle. Fun, though, aside from the time required for everyone to get their moment of notice (the price you pay for everyone else to hear your child’s name). Quick family and relatives supper before and short after gathering before he went to the all night (9 or 10 pm til 3 am) school (parent’s group) sponsored party- he crashed on a basement couch and his bed went to a relative. </p>

<p>Size of class will determine events. I remember skipping relative’s in suburb ceremonies and just going to the home parties. But got my sister to come to son’s ceremony (her H was out of town) because my son played in the orchestra… At first I didn’t understand why the seniors had to play on graduation night since it is a large group, but it was a nice touch- and we got the color photo of our son and his viola in the next morning’s local paper’s random shots of graduation!</p>

<p>The local paper has a supplement in spring with a listing of all the area schools’ graduates- vals/sals, any honor distinctions noted at the schools’ discretion. It takes months for them to publish area HS semester honor rolls, and small notes for any academic awards and such, as submitted by interested agencies. There is far too much sports coverage and no pursuit of academics in general.</p>

13

<p>I love seeing the list of where everyone is going to college. First I am an elementary teacher at a school that feeds into the same high school my kids attend. So I like seeing where my old students are headed after high school. I really don’t see them enough to ask them. I think it would be way too much to put everywhere they applied. I really don’t think that is everyone’s business. But I love to see what everyone decided to do after graduation. I think if a student doesn’t want others to know this information then maybe they need to rethink their decision. I would think at this point students should be over any disappointments of not getting into their first choice school and ready to move on.</p>

14

<p>At my high school, there was a list published in the school paper’s seniors edition of where everyone was going. Also, we have an awards night about a week before graduation, which is incredibly long, but ensures a short graduation ceremony, while allowing everyone to be honored. One of the big traditions at my school is to put your school’s abreviation on your graduation cap. It’s always fun for the parents, since they are sitting up on bleachers in the football field, while we are on chairs on the field itself. Makes for a very colorful graduation. Our principle pledges every year to have graduation under an hour and fifteen minutes. It certainly worked fine my year!</p>