With graduations being held over the next few weeks, I congratulate the students, teachers and school staff for persevering and triumphing over the past, difficult year.

I remember when my graduation day was on the horizon back in 1980 and I had an uneasy feeling about whether I was “qualified” to participate in my graduation ceremony. First off, I wasn’t a top-notch student who aced all my classes nor was I a slouch, but something kept creeping into my thoughts that graduation was going to be cataclysmic  in some way.

When I attended Fridley Grace High School from 1976-79, I  struggled in my first year of a new school and failed Algebra II. I knew I needed to complete at least two years of mathematics in order to graduate, but I figured I’d make that class up in my later years. 

In my sophomore year, I took Geometry I & II and passed and my junior year I waited until the second semester to take another mathematics course to cover the Algebra II failure. Well, that “mathematics” course that year was Intro to Computers and after just a few weeks in that class, I fell so far behind, I told the teacher I needed to drop out.

Again, figuring I had one more year of high school to get that one math requirement I needed, I finished my junior year feeling pretty good about myself.

However, just after school let out for the year, I was informed I needed to attend summer school because I was going to fall a couple credits short of qualifying for graduation. Oh no!

All my focus from that point on came in trying to save my summer fun from being hijacked by summer school.

I talked with a friend of mine who attended a public school in Minneapolis and he said I should consider his school because they had trimesters, meaning I could attain the amount of credits I needed by attending school there. What a decision! Who in their right mind would ever consider willfully to change schools heading into their senior year? Besides, I thought there was no way in heck my parents were going to agree to the change from me attending a parochial school to an “unregulated” school.

But I was wrong.

I asked my mom what she thought of the idea and she just shrugged her shoulders. Later did I realize she probably was thrilled to death to save that $2,000 a year tuition she and dad were paying to keep me at FG.

So, reluctantly and to avoid ruining my summer fun, I registered and was accepted to attend Patrick Henry HS in Minneapolis that coming fall.

Thankfully I had plenty of neighborhood friends who attended PHHS, so it wasn’t a complete shock to me socially. The school was decent and the classmates were fun and it was a great, overall experience for me. I even had better grades my senior year.

But again, I had that nagging thought in my mind the school was going to come to me before graduation and say I hadn’t completed my requirements to graduate.

And to top it all off,  on the day of graduation, I had no idea they intentionally don’t put the actual certificate of graduation in the diploma sleeve until after the ceremony and you return your cap and gown. So, when I was handed my diploma sleeve and returned to my seat, my eyes bulged out of my head when inside there was no diploma. I thought they had kept it from me for not fulfilling my obligations.

What a crazy year 1980 was! But nothing compared to what 2021 grads have had to deal with over the past school year.

Grads, keep your heads up. The diploma sleeve may be empty, but your futures surely aren’t.