High school graduation ceremonies could move to Thanksgiving

In the old days, many schools in eastern Canada held their high school graduations in the fall. My high school had a ceremony, although we didn’t do caps and gowns, but instead we were encouraged to wear dress clothes.

We walked across the stage, our parents clapped, there was a valedictorian (in my graduating year it was Colin, the school prankster, now a veterinarian), remarks from the principal and a performance by the school’s concert band.

This was all done in about two hours, 15 minutes.

Commencement, as it was called in Ontario, was always on the Thanksgiving weekend after we graduated.

Kids weren’t connected through social media — this was 1984 after all — so it was a great chance to see our friends, some for one final time.

Although grad was in the fall, our prom was in June.

“Footloose,” I remember, was the song that closed the night. Depending on the month of your birthday, half of the Grade 13s were of legal drinking age, but we didn’t embark on a dangerous sundown party. Having a few friends over to the house beforehand was in vogue.

On the final day of class instruction, instead of tearful goodbyes where everyone sobbed hysterically about never seeing each other again, it was, “Bye for now. See you at commencement in the fall.”

By the time commencement rolled around, everyone had settled into college, university or the workforce and it was indeed a reunion.

Except for the few students who studied abroad, everyone was coming home for Thanksgiving anyway.

Even though it prevented staff members from going away for the holiday weekend, teachers were never reluctant to attend.

For the graduates, none of us were sad that high school had ended because by Thanksgiving, most of us realized college and university are a lot more fun.

As school administrators are presently working hard to assure the grads have an online graduation celebration (and assuming gatherings of more than 50 are lifted by the fall), a Thanksgiving commencement would be worth considering.

It worked for years in eastern

Canada.