With graduation approaching on June 13 at 8 p.m., the Associated Student Body (ASB), the school administration and various student performers are preparing for the event and ceremony at Memorial Stadium.
The ceremony involves events such as speeches and musical performances, ending with the students receiving their diploma cover slips and officially graduating from high school.
“I like the end, to see the students turn their tassels and be officially graduated, and the excitement on their faces and their families’ faces as they’re leaving the stadiums,” Security Specialist Dwayne Mattis said. “Some kids cry, some families cry because it’s been a struggle to get to this point.”
The school administration recruits for three major roles: the host, the speech-givers and the performers. Auditions for these roles, which ended in late April, were open to any senior.
“There’s not any requirements in the sense of ‘you have be a straight A student or the most popular person in your class,’” ASB advisor Laura Lehni said. “It’s really open to anyone who’s going to graduate this year, any senior that’s going to be participating in the commencement ceremony.”
The hosts will be seniors Carina Mazzola and Zoe Thompson. The duties of the hosts are primarily to give the opening, land acknowledgement and closing.
“My closing speech is very short,” Mazzola said. “I try to thank everybody for coming and thank the students for the hard work they did, recognize people who aren’t here, and then I also talk about an idea that my Aunt told me – even if you’re scared to go do something, just remember that most of the people around you are just faking it.”
The primary speakers aside from the hosts will be, in order, Principal Abby Hunt, Student Speaker Nina Ando, and Staff Speaker Dwayne Mattis, each of whom will give a speech. Between the speeches will be various musical performances, such as “The Times, They Are a-Changing” performed by the Concert Choir and Advanced Chorale, and “Firework,” performed by Miriam Mathan and Hailey Hutchins.
“It’s supposed to be a speech of a little bit of remembrance,” Mattis said. “Something that they can hold onto for pushing them forward for their future.”
Some graduating students will receive cords, marks of honor for achieving certain things during their high school career. According to Lehni, students can get cords for participating in student unions such as Black and Brown Student Union, nationally recognized clubs such as National Honor Society, service-focused clubs or taking AP classes.
According to Mazzola, the school has split the cords for AP classes this year into the categories of AP STEM (for instance, science and math classes) and AP Humanities (for subjects such as ELA and languages).
After the ceremony, some seniors will board buses to Senior Spree, a night-long party at a series of secret venues. They will return to the BHS campus at 5:30 a.m. the next day.
“Students are not allowed to leave the event at any time,” the Ballard High School website says. “If they are sent home for any reason, the parent/guardian will be called to come pick them up at the event—not a friend, sibling, etc.”
With the ceremony approaching, seniors throughout the school are practically and emotionally preparing for the end of high school.
“Honestly it’s been really wild to me,” senior Terri De Leon said. “I don’t think the fact that I am graduating has fully set in yet, but it is liberating and I’m really proud of all the educational progress I’ve made in the last four years.”
Throughout the year, the counselors work to make sure students get their graduation requirements done in time. Counselor Thomas Kramer lists passing all of one’s classes, returning all school materials, clearing all one’s fines and fees, completing one’s PE credits or PE waiver, doing the PE Comp Test, completing one’s service hours and doing all the Naviance tasks as requirements seniors should make sure they’ve done.
“There are some students who are still in a spot right now where they are still having to do some extra work to make sure they’re going to pass a class or two,” counselor Thomas Kramer said. “That takes work, and takes encouragement and support and energy, but that’s what we do, so we do.”
At the ceremony itself, the counselors make sure the students get lined up in order and get name cards that will be read to the audience.
“We give them their card, we line them up, and then the ceremony starts,” Kramer said. “We help them make sure they get to their seats, and then the show begins.”
