A banner year for PRHS graduates
The seniors of the Class of 2020 of Pea Ridge High School will have the most unique commencement ceremony in the history of the school.
With a new high school facility under construction, this class is the last to graduate from the current facility. And, for the first time in history, they will not have a public commencement ceremony due to quarantines and social distancing regulations imposed by the state.
Each graduate will walk across a stage in a nearly empty room, pick up a diploma and be allowed four people present for photographs. That process will be video-taped and those segments of tape will be edited and assembled to create a virtual graduation ceremony for families and friends to view what heretofore has been a traditional, expected event. The taping will be done Monday, May 18, and Tuesday, May 19, for the graduation film which will be released at 2 p.m. Saturday, May 30. All speeches will be prerecorded.
The plan limits the number of people in a room to 10 and each person entering the building must be screened and have their take temperature taken, according to PRHS principal Charley Clark. Counting needed school personnel, it was decided each graduate could have four visitors present for the solitary walk across the stage.
“The one thing we heard from our students and parents was they wanted it to be special,” PRHS principal Charley Clark said. “Based on the circumstances, we couldn’t do a large gathering.
“We wanted to find a way to get family members in the gym — this is a special thing. We didn’t want to just hand a diploma to them as they drive by in a car or just mail it to them,” he said, explaining that when Gov. Asa Hutchinson announced there
could not be any graduation ceremonies before July 1, he also advised school administrators to present a plan to the state Department of Education for alternative plans for graduation.
Clark said different districts submitted many different plans including postponing as long as possible.
“It’s just real important to us that they (students and their parents) feel good about it as well,” Clark said. Clark said he worked with assistant superintendent Anne Martfeld, Holly Dayberry, Misty Harris and Jessica Woods in plans for the PRHS graduation ceremony. He commended Courtney Hurst for her work on the scholarship ceremony, which will also be virtual.
Although postponing the ceremony was an option, Clark said many PRHS graduates “go straight to the work force and the military and at some point you have to have closure.”
“We were looking at a situation where we didn’t know what the future held,” he said, adding Pea Ridge received approval Monday, May 4, for the plan they submitted the previous week.
Clark said he is trying to provide the best possible experience for the graduating seniors to create a memorable experience.
“He (Clark) always has the kids’ best interests in mind,” Kasey Snow, said. Snow, who used to work at the school, is also the mother of a graduating senior and she was the driving force behind the senior banners displayed along North Curtis Avenue.
Banners on display
Banners hang above North Curtis Avenue — one for each Pea Ridge High School senior of 2020 — to recognize the young men and women who will not walk across a stage in front of an audience as seniors have here for more than a century. Parents and donors purchased the banners and brackets for the signs to honor the students who will not have a walk-through graduation ceremony because of the covid-19 pandemic restrictions.
The banners, each 22by 36-inches, display a graduating senior’s photograph and name. They were made by A&B Reprographics.
“When we found out there wasn’t going to be a graduation, I began looking for ways to ease the community; give them something to cling to. I was just fishing,” Snow said. She said she found the idea and once she proposed it, it was readily accepted by fellow parents of PRHS seniors.
“The minute we hung those banners, a parent texted me saying she just sat and cried because it gave her something to see,” Snow said.
Snow said: “There were so many hands in the pot” creating the project commending her husband, Chris Snow, for the technical aspects, and Nathan See, city Street Department superintendent, for his contributions.
The Snows created a fundraiser and more than the $4,000 requested was raised. The funds were used to purchase the banners and the brackets used to hang them. The brackets will be donated to the city for future projects. The remaining funds, about $1,500, were given to the senior class, who will, under the guidance of sponsor Jessica Woods, decide how to use the funds.
“This was quite fun,” Snow said.
“Thank you so much!” Chris Snow wrote on the fundraiser Facebook page. “Wow!! Such an out pouring of love and support from our community to our Seniors! We look forward to getting these banners up and showing some pride and honor for our Pea Ridge High School 2020 graduating class!
There were almost 100 people who donated to the project, according to the fundraiser page.
PRHS graduation history
Young men and women have graduated from Pea Ridge High School since at least 1916 when the high school evolved from the college opened in 1884 in downtown Pea Ridge. Over the decades, the community and school grew.
In 2000-2001, a new high school was constructed further west of downtown, at the current site on West Pickens Road.
Ultimately, graduation ceremonies became too large for local venues and were held in Rogers at the Expo Center (in 2004 and 2005) and then in Barnhill Arena at the University of
Arkansas in Fayetteville (2006-2014).
In 2014, the School Board voted to bring graduation back to town and the ceremonies have been held in Blackhawk Stadium since 2015.
Graduating class size remained fairly stable ranging from a low of 19 in 1970 to a high of 76 in 2004 with most classes in the 35-55 range. In 20009, there were 101 graduates and in 2013, there were 114.
This year, there are 164 graduating seniors.