Seniors celebrate commencement

The 51st Sisters High School Commencement held Friday, June 4, marked the beginning of life after high school for 86 graduates.

The ceremony included all the traditional elements - caps and gowns, speeches, farewells, flowers - along with some nontraditional additions, including a video featuring grads from babyhood to adolescence.

Associated Student Body president Jeff Guggenheim welcomed the capacity crowd to the celebration of the Class of 1999, and introduced special guests Guy Gleason, representing the school board, and Carol Dixon and Michael Baynes, teachers chosen by the seniors to distribute diplomas and dispense congratulatory hugs and handshakes.

After the presentation of roses by individual graduates to their mothers, Sydney Dixon gave the salutatory address. Breaking from the traditional welcome, Dixon presented her views on censorship. She chose the topic after the live coverage of the Littleton, Colorado, shootings was turned off throughout the high school when some staff members agreed the spontaneous live broadcast might be too traumatic for students to watch live.

"Censorship is the cataract in our eyes," she said. "It is narrow-mindedness. It is telling millions of people what books they can or cannot read...it is the suffocating of creativity," she said.

Following Dixon, Steven Hyde, who shared valedictorian honors with Aubrey Denzer, complimented his classmates on all of their accomplishments and reminisced about some of the people who have inspired him, including teachers Mary Flande, Glen Herron, and Rand Runco.

He quoted Margaret Mead: "Never doubt that a small group of dedicated people can change the world. Indeed it is the only thing that ever has."

After Hyde bade his classmates farewell and wished them good luck, Denzer took the stage and, in a heartfelt message for which she received a rousing ovation from her classmates, she pointed out the maturing her class had undergone and the continued need to show respect and love for one another.

"Haven't you noticed how we have gradually put aside our differences?" she asked. "Sometimes I wonder why it took us so long. Maybe it was necessary that we developed this over the course of the past four years in high school in order to teach us one of the most important truths of our lives. What is more important than learning to love what you do and learning to love those around you?"

A lengthy video presentation recapping images and film footage of the graduates followed the speeches, prompting shouts of joy and laughter from the graduates. Senior class president Tara Johnson presented a gift from the class of '99 to the school and went on to surprise principal Dennis Dempsey with a special, complimentary thank you to mark the end of his seven-year stint at the helm of the high school.

"It's like you're graduating with us," she joked, "but it took you seven years instead of four.

"You've been the best principal we could ever ask for," she said.

Finally, it was Dempsey's turn to make comments of his own, and he took a cordless mike out among the graduates to address some of them individually. After returning to the stage, he admonished the students to not worry; to live up to their own expectations, not someone else's; not to let the negative people of the world siphon them dry; and to take time for family and friends.

His final piece of advice got a laugh from the crowd as he encouraged the seniors not to forget to be crazy sometimes.

"As I once heard a long time ago in Alaska, don't forget once in a while to drop your pants and slide on the ice!"

Dempsey then called on all 86 of the graduates, from Thomas Barrier to Janell Wysong, to receive diplomas. After moving their tassels over, the class of 1999 sent their caps flying amid ecstatic screams and marched briskly out of the gymnasium toward new beginnings.