Students don't get diploma due to excess cheering from crowd

[CutiePie2000]

Maybe the person who does the "name announcing" could pause to let the noise die down, so that the next person following could actually have their name heard by their family. The pauses would add up and take forever, but I guess you've got to do what you've got to do.

[UGAalum94]

What you are suggesting is entirely reasonable, but if people were behaving reasonably no school would have gone to this holding the diploma thing.

Have you been to a graduation, particularly a high school graduation in the last few years?

Really, the stuff you are suggesting would work if the people in attendance weren't selfish jerks, but some of them are.

I honestly believe that if they figured you would wait for them to quiet down, it would become a contest in how long they could make noise. You see, it's all about them and their kids. They don't care about you or your kids or the decorum of the event. They think they are behaving in a positive and celebratory way and that it's their right to do so.

In the linked news story there were only five graduates who had guests who did anything excessive, and this was after they publicized this policy and the kids knew what would happen. Why not let them enforce it this way and get the excessiveness down to zero?

There's always some loser who can't follow the policy and then wants to appeal for sympathy when the consequences they were told would follow a given behavior actually happen. Don't give it to them. All the sad graduates should be told to get their sympathy from Aunt Sally with the air horn.

[UGAalum94]

From the article:

"About a month before the May 27 ceremony, Galesburg High students and their parents had to sign a contract promising to act in dignified way. Violators were warned they could be denied their diplomas and barred from the after-graduation party."

There you have it folks. The only thing that's happened is that the school actually followed through.

[PM_Mama00]

My high school graduation was very.. um.. ceremonious... is that a word? It was very serious. And we were definitely warned that if we did anything to screw it up, we wouldn't get our diplomas. This included excessive cheering, tossing caps, etc. But then again, we didn't have the kind of crowd that would be hooting and hollering, and we also had a certain amount of tickets to give to family.

[UGAalum94]

Originally Posted by PM_Mama00

My high school graduation was very.. um.. ceremonious... is that a word? It was very serious. And we were definitely warned that if we did anything to screw it up, we wouldn't get our diplomas. This included excessive cheering, tossing caps, etc. But then again, we didn't have the kind of crowd that would be hooting and hollering, and we also had a certain amount of tickets to give to family.

I'm glad to hear that not all of them have this problem. But maybe some of what you and SWTXBelle mentioned are what bothers me so much. I'm assuming that yours too might be a private school.

I really want to believe in public schools, and when things come up about how public school kids and parents can't act right, it really makes me sad in a bigger way than just air horns at graduation would bother me.

I don't want public education to only be for trashy people. But when you can't even conduct a graduation ceremony with decorum and seriousness, it makes me think that public education might really only be for the low class.

[PM_Mama00]

Originally Posted by Alphagamuga

I'm glad to hear that not all of them have this problem. But maybe some of what you and SWTXBelle mentioned are what bothers me so much. I'm assuming that yours too might be a private school.

I really want to believe in public schools, and when things come up about how public school kids and parents can't act right, it really makes me sad in a bigger way than just air horns at graduation would bother me.

I don't want public education to only be for trashy people. But when you can't even conduct a graduation ceremony with decorum and seriousness, it makes me think that public education might really only be for the low class.

I went to public school.

[SWTXBelle]

I think one problem is the sheer size of the graduating class - when you have 600+ students graduating, the odds are higher that you will have some parents/family/friends who don't/won't behave.

[UGAalum94]

Originally Posted by PM_Mama00

I went to public school.

This gives me some hope! What did your school do to get these results?

I do think the size of the class is part of the issue.

Again, I regret that I seem so negative, but I really think those of you making such reasonable suggestions really have no idea what you are dealing with as far as irrational members of the public and how they deal with school officials. I get the feeling that Carnation does, but I'm sure we both wish we didn't.

It's not a really big section of the public school enrollment, in my opinion, but they pretty much ruin it for everyone else.

Some of the folks making noise are people who even when asked to leave aren't going to go until the cops come and get them, which let's face it, ruins the ceremony for everyone else even more.

They're going to test your authority time and time again. This school is trying to set up a policy in advance and then follow through to make the graduates choose their guests more carefully and to make sure that the guests know there are consequences that will follow if they act up.

I say more power to them and I hope they don't back down. If only five groups acted that way, it seems to me that the community will support the school's effort, and I hope they do. If they stick to their guns, they will be able to set the tone they want for graduation.

As far as it not mattering because it's high school, for some kids it's as far as they will go and they deserve a nice ceremony. Besides that, it's just not how people should act, period. You don't bring cowbells and air horns to ceremonies. We don't have to culturally dumb it down for the yahoos all the time, do we?

[carnation]

[QUOTE=Alphagamuga;1459684]
I honestly believe that if they figured you would wait for them to quiet down, it would become a contest in how long they could make noise. You see, it's all about them and their kids. They don't care about you or your kids or the decorum of the event. They think they are behaving in a positive and celebratory way and that it's their right to do so.[QUOTE]

Yeah! Best quote ever! And it doesn't just apply to graduations but to a lot of what parents do, especially in the school arena. Because "it's all about them and their kids"!

[KSigkid]

I think you could ask the people to leave without having the students wait for a diploma.

I think this goes a bit too far, especially for a high school graduation. With a college graduation, I can understand it a bit more.

[GeekyPenguin]

Originally Posted by CutiePie2000

Maybe the person who does the "name announcing" could pause to let the noise die down, so that the next person following could actually have their name heard by their family. The pauses would add up and take forever, but I guess you've got to do what you've got to do.

That's what my high school and college did. They would say 'Amy So and So' and then she would walk across the stage, get the diploma, do the handshake, pose, and go down the steps. By that point the clapping/yelling was done, so they'd then move on to 'Bob Sorrysoandso' and his family had time to do their thing.

[33girl]

Quite franky, I think behavior like this has something to do with the fact that graduation ceremonies aren't special anymore. They used to have them for high school and college, that was IT. Now, anything is a "milestone." Graduation from middle school or junior high. Graduation from summer camp. Graduation from any old grade. One of my friends just went to a kindergarten graduation, for God's sake. The next thing is going to be slapping a mortar board on a newborn's head to celebrate its "womb graduation."

[KSigkid]

Originally Posted by 33girl

Quite franky, I think behavior like this has something to do with the fact that graduation ceremonies aren't special anymore. They used to have them for high school and college, that was IT. Now, anything is a "milestone." Graduation from middle school or junior high. Graduation from summer camp. Graduation from any old grade. One of my friends just went to a kindergarten graduation, for God's sake. The next thing is going to be slapping a mortar board on a newborn's head to celebrate its "womb graduation."

Part of that as well could be that more people are going to college now. It used to be that high school was the high point of most people's academic careers, and now it's more expected that kids will go to some sort of college. The college graduation has taken away a lot of the importance of the high school one.

[UGAalum94]

I was trying to make really clear that I think the majority of teenagers and their parents are excellent*. Really, I do. Very few people make any trouble at all. It's just the small percentage of people who don't care ruin it for the rest.

The rotten apples basically insist that you have punitive policies because you can't depend on them to act right unless something bad will happen to them if you don't.

The school basically has to decide if they are going let everything go or try to do something to make people act right.

Most schools have elected not to follow through with anything. I admire this school for trying to have nice graduations for all the kids and parents who want to mark the occasion with a sense of politeness and decorum, a group I honestly believe probably make up 98% or more of the total group.

I don't think it's the perfect system for many of the reasons you all have mentioned, but I think it could be one important step.

I agree that graduations aren't special anymore, and I might go along with the "it's because so many people go to college" idea except that you see the same behavior at even college graduations. Some people have come to think it's cute to act this way, and they expect to get away with it.

*But I will note that even some of the excellent kids manipulate or try to manipulate their parents. You really don't think this is true?

[AGDee]

My kids had a preschool graduation too. I thought that was a crock.