School district crowdsourcing graduation ideas from seniors

Published 9:00 am Saturday, April 11, 2020

No one knows what graduation ceremonies will look like this spring amid the COVID-19 pandemic.

How these high school and college traditions will be handled has a lot to do with timing. As the number of confirmed novel coronavirus cases continues climbing, with each passing day it becomes less and less likely that graduations will go on as planned.

The Baldwin County School District (BCSD) reached out to this year’s graduating seniors Tuesday for their input on how the local public school system will handle 2020 commencement exercises. A link on the school district’s Facebook page takes students to a survey they can fill out through the end of next week as school officials crowdsource ideas during this unprecedented time.

Baldwin High School’s 2020 graduation is currently scheduled for 9 a.m. on Saturday, May 23, inside the Georgia College Centennial Center. Gov. Brian Kemp’s recent extension of the state public health emergency through May 13 does not preclude that original date yet, but the survey has been implemented should that turn out to be the case. 

“We do not know if large gatherings will be allowed by the time we get to the end of May,” Baldwin County School Superintendent Dr. Noris Price said in an email. “Therefore, just in case, we want an alternative plan for the graduation ceremony. We thought it was important to take the students’ input into consideration before a final decision is made. As a school district, we are committed to recognizing the Class of 2020 and will explore all options available to us.”

The social media link takes seniors to a short survey where they are asked to provide their first and last names, an email address and answer an open-ended question. 

“If we are not able to have a traditional graduation ceremony on May 23rd, what suggestions would you like to share with us regarding the 2020 graduation ceremony?” the question reads. Finally, the survey asks that if graduation were held in June, July or August would the respondent be willing to attend with yes, no and maybe given as answer options. 

Along with the survey, Dr. Price published a letter to the Class of 2020 congratulating them on reaching the big milestone of securing their high school diplomas. Though the letter comes off a bit like the school year has been declared over, the superintendent assures that students still have some work to do.

“The school year is not over and teachers are still teaching remotely,” she said. “My letter was referring to the students completing their senior year with us, not the school year was over. Many of these students have been with us since elementary school.”

Seniors have until the end of next week to have their say in the survey.