Quiet Please

I attended my second Hillcrest High School graduation ceremony last night at the Bi-Lo Center in Greenville. Congratulations to my little sister Cassie Jo who graduated with above a 4.0 GPA and an academic and athletic scholarship to Converse College! Way to go Cassie, we are all so proud of your hard work!

Hillcrest graduated over 500 students. To make it go as fast as they could, they give a speech beforehand asking/pleading/begging for the parents not to clap or yell when their child’s name is called. This way they can run down the list of names quickly without waiting for the noise to stop or risking someone not being able to hear their child’s name called. This is an OK idea on the face. But in reality, there are many parents who ARE going to cheer when their son/daughter gets their diploma, it WILL happen. Hillcrest knows this, so to “solve” this problem they post police officers at each isle. When the renegade family makes noise by clapping or cheering the police kick them out of the ceremony. This of course causes a huge distraction for everyone else. And as the ceremony proceeds, more and more parents rebel against the rules and simply get up and leave after cheering. This causes laughter and more distractions. The whole thing turns into a kind of circus with cheering parents and police and laughing and pointing. Unfortunately, the students suffer as much attention is taken away from them and their big night.

I thought Hillcrest would learn their lesson after the first time this happened, but sadly they have not and continue to insist on trying to quiet the crowd. We are in the Bi-Lo center for goodness sake! Just turn up the sound system! If you would just ask the parents to be brief and respectful when they cheer, than each family would give a quick cheer and no one would be distracted. Everyone’s attention would stay focused on the kids and not on the “disruptions” and the police officers. You can’t even hear someone cheering on the other side, the place is too huge. Hillcrest should stop this asinine policy immediately.

E-mail the Principle at “schamnes@greenville.k12.sc.us”

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