It was bound to happen. A shooting at a high school graduation just seems par for the course these days. I can't think of a worse place for panic. As a veteran of at least 30 high school graduations, I've seen them decline in quality and substance. For that reason, I volunteered to run the tryouts and judging of grad speakers at my high school. I did that for about 10 years. Of course, there were other judges that included students and parents. A well-balanced approach.
What I noticed is that the ceremony of the graduation became increasingly less formal. So much so that it began to feel like a mockery. Aside from students dancing or romping, or strutting across the stage, the parents often were most out of control. The "ceremony was so noisy on the occasion that no one could hear anything.
It got so bad that most educators I know couldn't wait for it all to end. Is this what we want? I kept asking myself that question, with very little sense of outrage from some, and apathy from others. Finally, I settled on a compromise. I must accept that I'm essentially old school about all the screaming and strutting. I decided to let that go in favor of some speeches of substance.
In that area, we made some gains. One year, when my district almost went bankrupt, and 19 teachers were laid off, one of the speakers said what everybody was thinking. She delivered the most effective speech I've ever seen questioning the powers that be who allow budgets to be cut, dynamic young teachers to be let go, and the ineptitude of lawmakers to prevent these situations from re-occurring every year. Of course, some of those same powers had edited her speech and removed some of the most controversial (in their view) content. But...She went ahead and delivered her speech just the way it originally appeared. She was right in the middle of her graduation. What were they going to do? She knew what speech would be delivered and had no intention of making any changes.
That's why I say it was bound to happen. The school is a reflection of the community. Nothing more, nothing less. If the community has gun violence problems, those problems get invited to graduation too. Somehow there is a great irony here. Graduation is one of the closest institutions we have in this culture to a rite of passage. It marks, in a formal way the passage from childhood to adulthood. With the loss of decorum and the fear of violence, what are we saying about what matters and what can we expect for these newly minted adults?
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