Students from the Southwick-Tolland Regional High School celebrate their graduation in the soccer field at the Powder Mill Middle School as part of a long-standing tradition. This year the ceremony will be staged indoors due to the renovations of the present track and field. The high school is in the background. (File photo by Frederick Gore)
SOUTHWICK – Students at Southwick-Tolland-Granville Regional High School look forward each year to the tradition of “walking the hill” to graduation.
This year, that long-awaited walk is probably going to be a shorter trip down the auditorium aisle.
A group of students presented a petition to the School Committee this week asking to continue the tradition of an outdoor graduation after they were told last week the ceremony would be moved indoors.
Senior Kathryn Merritt told the committee that students were very upset at the sudden change in plans.
“The Class of 2014 has gone through a lot of changes and we’ve had a lot of things taken away from us,” Merritt said. “We’ve had our school under construction, four vice principals in four years and we just want to keep something the same.”
Merritt said she understood that recent graduation ceremonies got out of control and she believed moving the ceremony indoors was in some way a punishment for the behavior of former students.
“I know you’re trying to transfer to an indoor graduation, but I think this is not the year to do it when our school is only half-built,” Merritt said.
Barry said the high school track renovation is driving the move.
“The track project is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity,” Barry said. “We’re trying to navigate the completion of the project around (next) spring sports schedules.”
In order to use the track next spring, work must begin as soon as possible. Because the outdoor graduation ceremony uses the track, and there is nowhere else to hold the ceremony outdoors, it must be held inside.
The new track project would most likely mean the end of the outdoor graduation tradition.
“The surface will have implications on what type of events will be held there in the future,” Barry said. “It is likely that site is not going to be available.”
