Traditional education reflects the changing of the seasons. I have always loved that the academic year mirrors a growing season. While a growing season culminates in a harvest, our season culminates in graduation. Graduation is beautiful and stressful, a beginning and an end, a time for mourning, a time for reflection, a time for celebration. The ceremony connects the present to the past, which is why it should rarely be changed.
We all can agree that any change is difficult. A definition of stress related to natural science could be the bending of a material under conditions of change. Our human endeavors and attitudes bend, uncomfortably so, upon conditions of change. Yet, change is also healthy and refreshing; change revitalizes our endeavors. And many of our educational endeavors need constant refinement, improvement, and yes, CHANGE. If I could just waive the magic wand, I would make the curriculum more relevant and meaningful, and make the instruction more engaging and effective. But graduation should remain the same.
When alumni attend graduation in support of a relative or friend, I want the ceremony to elicit the same emotions that they experienced upon their own graduation. Of course, the salutatorian and valedictorian speeches change and names change, but a common rope should connect all alumni. You have been a part of The Westfield School, and you are part of the Westfield family.
W. Carroll
The Westfield School Blog 