Plans for in-person Harwood Union graduation take shape

May 20, 2020  |  By Lisa Scagliotti

Students, faculty, administrators and hundreds of family and friends typically gather for graduation under a large tent on the Harwood Union school lawn, complete with folding chairs and a stage. Photo by Gordon Miller.

UPDATE: This story has been updated to note the new scheduled start time of 9 a.m. for graduation on June 20.

Plans are coming together so that one month from today, Harwood Union High School’s class of 2020 will mark its graduation with as much tradition as possible given the Covid-19 pandemic.

In an announcement Tuesday, school officials detailed plans for distributing caps and gowns to seniors next week and for the ceremony June 20 that is taking shape guided by a student committee. 

Principal Lisa Atwood said the 112 graduates may be scattered about the district completing their senior year academics at home, but a core group of students are meeting regularly via video conference to plan their commencement. 

“They acknowledge it will be different, but it will still embrace much of our traditions,” Atwood said.

The final three months of the school year have been up-ended since mid-March when in-person classes halted, schools across Vermont were closed, and students and teachers shifted to remote learning due to the Covid-19 virus outbreak. The weeks since have seen a string of senior year highlights canceled -- spring sports season, the annual musical, prom, choir and band performances, class trips. 

But the fact that their long-awaited graduation day is around the corner will become a bit more real next week when students visit the school to pick up their caps and gowns on May 26.  

Students will be asked to arrive by car and park in groups designated by Teacher Advisory groups for the distribution that will also include a keepsake banner for each student with their yearbook photo on it. 

A special event in early June, Atwood said, will be when Harwood Union is among the schools featured on WCAX-TV in special segments honoring Vermont high school graduates. The specific date and time will be communicated closer to when the Harwood feature airs sometime June 5-12, she said.

Graduation this year won’t look like this scene from 2019 as seniors march together for their commencement ceremony. Photo by Gordon Miller.

The video tributes will include senior class teachers, principals and more. “We’re trying to include as many people as possible,” Atwood said. 

The final day of school is June 12 and the original school calendar had graduation scheduled for June 13. But given the extraordinary circumstances this year, an extra week was added for planning and the ceremony is now scheduled for 9 a.m. June 20 on the front lawn at Harwood Union High School -- exactly where graduation ceremonies are held every year. 

Atwood said ideas for commencement have evolved over the past several weeks. 

“At first we were thinking there would be no in-person graduation -- it would have to be a virtual graduation online somehow,” she said. 

But recent announcements by Gov. Phil Scott included public health guidelines for limited public gatherings. “We started thinking we could have something and could we preserve as much of the tradition of graduation as possible.” 

Harwood’s ceremony is typically held outdoors under a large white tent on the lawn in front of the school with enough room under cover for graduates, teachers, administrators on stage, a small musical ensemble, and several hundred seated family and friends.The school mascot is a Highlander so bagpipers figure into the program, too. 

The big tent on the front lawn at Harwood Union High School signals graduation each year. This year graduates and their families will attend in their vehicles parked on the grass instead. Photo by Lisa Scagliotti.

A recent news story about a high school graduation being planned at a ski area in New Hampshire generated lots of calls and messages from the school community that sits just minutes from Mad River Glen and Sugarbush ski areas. “I was bombarded,” Atwood said. 

“But we’ve made other plans. The senior class council really wanted it at the school and on the front lawn according to tradition.”

New reality, familiar traditions

The plans coming together will feature elements of the usual program with plenty of modification for social distancing, limited personal contact, and people clustered in groups of 10 or fewer to abide by the public health guidelines, Atwood said. 

Details are still being nailed down but the general idea, Atwood said, will be for graduates to attend in one vehicle with their family. Instead of everyone gathering under a giant tent, vehicles will park on the lawn and families will remain in their cars. Tech staff are currently working with WDEV radio to arrange for the audio of the ceremony to be broadcast so everyone could tune in from their vehicles. 

Since Harwood’s mascot is a Scottish Highlander, graduation usually features bagpipe tunes. Photo by Gordon Miller.

Bagpipers will be booked and a small-scale stage and simple tent for cover will be erected for speakers to individually deliver their remarks from a podium. 

Longtime Harwood history teacher Greg Shepler who retires next month is on the program to deliver the main address, Atwood said. The program will include student speakers and recorded music from senior band members. 

The plan so far will be to call seniors from their cars -- at an appropriate distance -- so they could individually walk across the stage to receive their diplomas from Atwood. She said they will devise a way to wrap and put each diploma on a small table for the graduate to pick up -- minus hugs and handshakes, of course. 

There will be balloons and flowers as usual -- but this year everyone will be wearing masks, she added. 

Mad River TV plans to record the ceremony and a school photographer will shoot portraits of each graduate at their big moment receiving their diplomas, Atwood said. 

More pieces are still being discussed including elements students want to include. And, of course, contingency plans: “If we have a week of rain and we can’t park on the lawn, we can use the parking lot,” Atwood said. 

More updates will be shared in the coming days as plans fall into place. Atwood said the next question is how to conduct the annual senior awards ceremony, usually held the night before graduation. That’s the event to honor students for a wide range of achievements and to announce scholarship awards. “We still want to have this somehow,” she said. 

The commencement planning also marks a milestone for Atwood who is retiring at the end of this school year after 32 in the school district, 14 years of which were spent as a school administrator.

“Who could have ever imagined this year?” Atwood said.