For Fort St. James Secondary School students, graduation is looking a lot different this year due to the virus pandemic, but the school has found ingenious ways to make the day special for the Class of 2020.
Craig Houghton, principal of the high school provided the Caledonia Courier with this plan.
Rehearsal Ceremony for graduates is being held on June 18 at 10 a.m. This rehearsal is only for graduates and there are no guests allowed.
In terms of the actual ceremony, it is being held on June 19 at 12 p.m. Students will get dressed into their gowns in the old gym, and will have assistance of Andrew Mulroy and Barb Wenger.
A group photo will be taken at 12:30 p.m. by Clarke Action Photography’s Lorne Clarke. Graduates will be spaced apart in the field and the photographer will be on the roof. A copy of this photo will be given to each grad.
The Class of 2020 will then move to their assigned seats in the new gym, which has been spaced six feet apart.
The ceremony on June 19 will begin at 1 p.m. and will be live streamed by Andrew Vogelsang. Music will be controlled by Christine Deverson and the principal Craig Houghton will be the MC.
Ella Davis will be singing the national anthem on the piano, and guest speakers include James Waddell and valedictorian Nicole Boyde.
After the guest speakers finish their speech, there will be short video presentation of the graduates which has been provided by Vogelsang.
After, the video, the principal will begin calling grads on stage in an alphabetical order, where Houghton will read the graduates “what I want said at grad” and announce any awards that have been won.
There will be no physical contact between the graduates and anyone else on stage.
Once the graduate has their photo taken, they will leave the stage and go back to their seat.
At the same time, there will be guests lined up outside the school. The guest line up will wrap around to the front of the school with each set of guests six feet apart. The spacing will be marked, and line-up order will be posted on the school’s website and Facebook page.
There will be teachers that will help guests move into the gym to view their graduate. Once that’s done, guests are asked to leave the school grounds.
The school ceremony should take about 90 minutes and the Class of 2020 will be dismissed from the ceremony in small groups, and students have been asked to leave the school grounds immediately after their ceremony.
Lastly, a small number of grads (8 currently) and their family members, limit of 4 per grad, will have professional photos taken in the old gym after the ceremony, Houghton said.
Family groups will wait in the old gym for their session time. Each grad will be assigned a 10-minute session and will be asked to leave the school grounds immediately with their family after their photos, he added.
READ MORE: Pain, love and hope: Vanderhoof grad writes poem dedicated to the Class of 2020
Aman Parhar
Editor, Vanderhoof Omineca Express
aman.parhar@ominecaexpress.comLike us on Facebook and follow us on Twitter
