With the start of the fourth quarter, seniors will be wrapping up their final weeks of their high school careers. This final quarter brings a combination of stress and fun as students balance AP’s as well as the senior activities like prom, beach week and the highly anticipated graduation.
Graduation will be held on June 9 at DAR Constitution Hall and will look a little different this year. It has been tradition for all four class officers, president, vice president, secretary and treasurer, to give speeches during the ceremony. The speeches usually reflected upon the past four years of high school and favorite memories. For the class of 2025 officers however, only one person will be giving a speech. Class president Noah Friedman will speak to the class and parents at the beginning of the ceremony. The rest of the class officers will introduce guests, such as the commencement speaker and a Board of Education member. “I will be the first speaker and give a roughly three-minute address to the class and the parents to start the graduation ceremony,” Friedman said.
This was not the only change that the senior class was going to see in their graduation this year. It had been planned that seniors would no longer wear stoles representing groups such as senior planning, student government and National Honors Society. Every senior will be wearing a stole and that was supposed to be the only stole students will have. “What we’ve found is a logistical challenge. They’re all the same satin material. We have found chords and stoles in the lobby when people walk in, and they’re also really uneven. It’s a logistical topic that has come up,” graduation coordinator Christina Rice said.
In place of the stoles, there had been discussion of having pins students can wear on their gowns. This would allow for more clubs and leadership positions to be represented at graduation. However, students said they think that they should have stoles at graduation as a way to show the work they did for the school community as well as their grade over the past year. “It is showing that I’ve worked for the entire school, for the whole year. I worked for my class the whole year,” a senior who asked to remain anonymous said.
In response to an email Rice sent out on Apr. 1 informing the community of the changes, students and parents shared feedback regarding the change in regalia. Less than 24 hours later Rice sent another email to parents and students saying that “The graduation planning will delay any changes at this time, and stoles have been ordered for students in Senior Planning, SGA, and NHS.”
One of the events that kicks off what is known as senior season is senior picnic. In the past senior picnics have been held at Smokey Glen Farm in Gaithersburg. This year’s senior picnic will be a little different. The picnic will be held in the school’s lower parking lot on Friday, May 16, from 6 to 8 p.m.. There will be a video montage of senior memories as well as games. There will also be an assortment of food trucks. Unlike in years past, the senior picnic this year will have no ticket fee. The event will then lead into senior sunset that night.
Prom will be the next day and leads into seniors’ last week of school. “The core of the [picnic] in the first place is for people to wear their college clothes, take pictures and hangout,” Friedman said.
