If graduation ceremonies were to take place this month as scheduled, they would have to be online, with high school seniors taking part in virtual ceremonies, not getting the chance to walk across the stage with their peers as their families and friends cheer them on from the stands.
Local school leaders decided they didn’t want it to be that way.
Instead, Clark-Pleasant, Edinburgh, Franklin, Greenwood and Indian Creek schools have pushed back graduation ceremonies to mid-July, hoping by that time the threat of the coronavirus will have dissipated enough to give seniors a chance at one last proper hurrah.
Center Grove High School sent a survey to parents and students last week, and is awaiting the results of that survey before school officials make a decision on graduation. Administrators haven’t announced when that decision will be made, spokesperson Stacy Conrad said.
The first graduation ceremony will take place July 17. Greenwood Community High School will hold its ceremony at the high school campus. Greenwood schools will keep the tradition of a Friday evening ceremony alive, holding commencement at 7 p.m. If all continues as planned, meaning there would be no restrictions on crowd sizes starting July 4, the school could hold graduation in the gymnasium. Another possibility, which would allow for greater social distancing, would be the school’s football field, said Todd Garrison, high school principal.
“If we’re forced to do social distancing, that’s what we’re going to do,” Garrison said. “If we’re not allowed to have 3,000 people in one gym, we’re not going to do that. We’re making adjustments based on the information we have. To state what the ceremony will look like right now won’t make any sense.”
Franklin Community High School will be the first of at least four Johnson County school districts to hold a graduation ceremony July 18, a Saturday. The ceremony will take place at 9 a.m., although as is the case with other area high schools, a decision on the format will likely not be reached until the beginning of July, to see if the state can indeed fully reopen, or if more restrictions are in place due to a second wave of COVID-19, which has killed almost 100 Johnson County residents already.
Before making the decision to hold a ceremony in July, school officials sent a survey to Franklin Community High School seniors and their parents asking if they would prefer to have a virtual graduation in May or wait until July for the possibility of a traditional ceremony. The majority chose July, said Steve Ahaus, high school principal.
“There are three scenarios: virtual, a full graduation ceremony or some kind of smaller group social-distanced version,” Ahaus said. “We’ll plan for all three and see what the future holds.”
As is the case with other school districts, the gymnasium would be able to hold a full non-socially distanced graduation that would be safe from the elements. Holding a ceremony on the football field, while larger and able to accommodate a more spread-out crowd, would be dependent on the weather.
If people are required to revert back to the stay-at-home order, a virtual graduation could involve a YouTube or Facebook Live video with a reading of students’ names along with slides of each student, he said.
Indian Creek High School will hold its ceremony at 10 a.m., July 18, and is committed to not having a virtual ceremony, instead doing everything necessary to hold an in-person graduation while still keeping student safety at the forefront, said Luke Skobel, high school principal.
“By and large, we don’t know what the restrictions are going to be July 18; it’s supposed to be back to normal,” Skobel said. “If it remains that way, we’ll have a traditional ceremony in the gym as we’ve always done. It could be anywhere from that to wearing face masks with limited guests. The most extreme thing would be a graduation ceremony utilizing our parking lot, using our front drive with a stage and having it take place there with students remaining in vehicles.”
Students would exit their vehicles to walk across the stage and take their diploma, without shaking anyone’s hand, he said.
Seniors at Whiteland Community High School are set to take part in an 11 a.m. ceremony that same day. Unlike other high school principals, Benji Betts wouldn’t discuss possible locations for graduation. While an in-person ceremony is the school’s first choice, school officials want to make sure that if a virtual ceremony is necessary, it still honors students well, Betts said.
“I think one of the biggest things we want to look at, if there’s a virtual ceremony, is to honor each kid, with pictures and names read out like a normal ceremony in person, still having speeches by the valedictorian and salutatorian,” he said. “We want to keep the ceremony consistent with past ceremonies as much as possible, and still give families a memory of their child graduating from high school.”
Later on in the day, at 2 p.m., seniors at Edinburgh Community High School will receive their diplomas. The school is the smallest high school in the county, with 54 graduating seniors. School officials remain hopeful they can hold the ceremony in the gym, as per usual, said Kevin Rockey, principal.
“We can spread out if we need to and have only so many participants and family members in the crowd,” Rockey said. “Hopefully, by July 18, we can hold that as normal as possible, with either seats next to each other or spread out. We plan to hold it in the gym, but if something goes backwards, we’re holding it no matter what, virtually or somewhere in between, at the football field or in cars.”
IF YOU GO
While locations of graduation ceremonies remain up in the air, dates and times have been finalized. They are as follows:
Greenwood: 7 p.m. July 17
Franklin: 9 a.m. July 18
Indian Creek: 10 a.m. July 18
Whiteland: 11 a.m. July 18
Edinburgh: 2 p.m. July 18
Center Grove: TBD
