When Whiteland Community High School seniors visualized graduation, they never imagined sitting on the football field in 87-degree heat with the sun beating down on them.
They never imagined donning a mask with their cap and gown for their walk across the stage.
They never imagined they wouldn’t be allowed to shake hands with faculty as they received their diploma, or hear the school’s band and choir send them off.
But that is the reality for the Class of 2020. Class leaders say they are used to change, and their class is still ready to take on the world while entering adulthood in the midst of a pandemic.
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In a year colored by the coronavirus, seniors took a different path to graduation, but Principal Benji Betts said students showed remarkable patience and hard work in the past few months, finishing strong under challenging circumstances.
All graduating classes are told they are special, but the Class of 2020 is extra special, because the students have already shown they are capable of anything considering the sacrifices they made this year for the good of society, said Amar Heer, class secretary.
“We went from classrooms to connected learning just in one day. We went from going out with friends and families to staying at home to save lives. We also went from counting down our final days of senior year to just hoping, we as a class, can still … have our one last time together,” Heer said.
Not just the past three months have been trying, the class was born in an era of many changes at schools post 9/11, said salutatorian Trevor Moorman. Living in times of uncertainty has given the class the resilience they need to succeed in life after high school, he said.
“That uncertainty has defined this class and made us stronger and more resilient. All of this is proof that each of us, no matter what challenges that we face in the future, will be ready to take those on,” Moorman said.
Likening life to a book, valedictorian Sophie Venter said the class is in the epilogue of high school and the prologue of the rest of their lives. The class now has more freedom than ever to write their own story and create their own happy ending, she said.
“Each chapter is a fresh start,” Venter said. “No matter how different life may look for us next year, the life and the relationships that we have built in the past few years have made us who we are.”
