September: Meeting with the Jostens Rep - Jeremy Sawicki
Jeremy will come in and go through the order packet for graduation gear and class swag
He will leave a sheet that needs to be filled out within a couple of weeks over class song, motto, colors, and flower
In the past few years I have had my aid create a shared google doc with seniors to suggest these things, then narrowed it down to the top three and had them vote through a forms. (It alleviates all the hassle of a class meeting.)
Email Pam at Central Office and ask to be added to the senior class budget so that you can check on money available, deposit possible class dues or any fundraising, do a purchase order for materials needed for graduation.
October
Make sure to get information to Jeremy and Diana concerning flower, motto, colors, and song.
Song has to be approved by Mr Redden for graduation but you are the first line of approval. Have them post links to the song in the sharable doc and send you the lyrics.
Connect with Mrs Stroud about who is doing the senior page for graduation. We have stopped doing the video as a separate element of the graduation ceremony. It just starts when the doors open and loops continuously until the seniors are ready to walk in.
Make sure to bug seniors about getting senior pictures and baby pictures to Stroud by her deadline.
FeFlowers have gotten so expensive we couldn't buy them anymore from the flower shop. I ordered roses for 2024 from Globalrose.com a wholesaler and had them delivered on the Thu before graduation. Diane and I plus any seniors that wanted to show up to help put everything together on the Fri before graduation. It saved us about $800 going that route.
Follow up with Kasey Stroud about the video for graduation.
In my curriculum the seniors studied Carpe Diem poems. I then had them all write a Carpe Diem poem to their classmates about heading out into the world. I selected the ones best for a graduation experience, sent them out anonymously to the staff to vote, then selected a Senior Class Poet from the group. I had Megan make me a plaque that I presented at awards ceremony. I then had that person speak at graduation.
May
We are getting close. Work with Diane on the program to make sure all info is in there and correct.
Make sure that the video is approved by Mr Redden.
Graduation practice starts right after lunch on the Wed before graduation. ALL students need to attend to go through practice, check out, and get their caps and gowns.
Make sure there are two juniors from NHS to be flag-bearers for NHS. They will also be excused for graduation practice. They will also wear NHS cords at graduation. Professional dress; no jeans.
Based on the number of seniors graduation, a seating chart needs to be made going across all the first row and the second alphabetically. Work with Garrett or Mark to find out how many chairs there needs to be before creating the seating chart. Once the seating chart is done, then figure out who walks with who so they approach the stage alphabetically. Don't forget to leave a chair at the far end of row in the front for the NHS flagbearers.
Slideshow: Yearbook can be put together by yearbook, but will need to be edited and made sure that it can run automatically on a loop. I created a VLC playlist with about six graduation relevant songs on my desktop and set that up to run on a loop then played them both at the same time from my laptop starting about an hour before graduation until just before the seniors entered. We did away with a slideshow in the middle of graduation a couple years ago so that we could have more time for a speaker and senior class poet.
The day of graduation, seniors need to be in the library no later than 45 minutes before the ceremony starts. Diane should have distributed NHS cords and Honors cords when they were given their caps and gowns. They must turn these back into the office when they pick up their diplomas.