Sixteen students graduated high school in the Chilkat Valley this year and about 250 people gathered in the Haines High School gym on Tuesday to celebrate them.
Principal Lilly Boron said the class of 2024 already has one foot out the door — and their interests are varied. Some are headed to college where they say they plan to be pilots or librarians. One wants to study zoology, another to be an entrepreneur, others want to head straight into the workforce to be commercial fishermen or miners, one wants to be a diesel mechanic.
Grads receive more than $90k in local scholarships and awards
This is a class that has weathered some difficult years.
“We’ve handled typical obstacles such as grades and activity travel as well as atypical obstacles such as coming into high school with masks and online learning,” said salutatorian Raven Hotch during her speech.
Trenton Oaks, the valedictorian, echoed Hotch’s sentiments in his own words.
“You would think that after all these years, everyone would be close … ironically, we’ve never been close in our class,” he said. “Since the beginning of our high school careers, COVID has served as an additional layer. We had the option to attend classes in person or online during our first year.”
While the class isn’t close, Oaks said it gave them a chance to develop unique bonds. And, he said he’s excited to wish everyone luck in their own life plans.
“Even though we have our priorities in order, life could surprise us and drastically alter our plans,” he said. “After all, it’s been the story of our high school experience.”
Commencement
The class picked school counselor Kristen Brumfield to give the commencement address. Brumfield, who has been in her role since 2015 had the audience laughing for most of her speech.
She started by answering questions some of the students had asked her, things like “tell me something you learned in school as a kid?” She listed three things that she never uses or hopes to never have to use. First, to stop, drop and roll when she’s caught on fire. The second, taking cover during a tornado drill.
For the third, Brumfield reached under the podium and pulled out a plastic soprano recorder.
“Is this a national thing?” She asked, as the audience cracked up. “Did others here learn the recorder too?” Let me see a show of hands if you did. Ok, now, anyone still rockin’ that thing regularly? Yeah, me neither.”
Outside of school, she told the room she’d learned as a child to respect her elders, laugh often and follow her parents’ example of making and maintaining friendships.
“Both were and are master letter writers,” she said.
She also said the students asked her what she’s learned as an adult and listed 10 things she told the students was the core of her address to them.
- Learn to say ‘I’m sorry.” “And, if you can give a proper apology — maybe like I taught you in class in the past – make it sincere, make it meaningful. Make it last and do it for the other person more than for yourself.”
- Learn to say “I was wrong.” “We can be and often are wrong a lot of times, and owning it should not be as difficult as it is. Learning to just swallow your pride and say it is powerful.”
- Learn to say “I don’t know.” “Not in the, ‘lazy, I’m not going to pause to think a moment way … but in the genuine ‘actually, I don’t know the answer, but I’m going to find out’ way.”
- Learn to both ask for and accept help. “Both are far more difficult than it seems they should be. When we are very young we need assistance with everything, but as we age, we gain independence and self-reliance, typically finding it harder and harder to ask or accept help from others,” she said. “The fact is, people get joy from helping others.”
- Be true to yourself. “Spend time in self-exploration and becoming self-aware,” she said. “Listen to what others might be telling you, even if you might not want to hear it. It could be valuable feedback.”
- Find your people. “Those who allow you to be yourself,” she said. “Your wonderful, wacky, silly, unique self. This is where you will find belonging.”
- You are not responsible for other people’s reactions and emotions. “So long as you act in the best way you can and do so with integrity and with the best of intentions towards others, you are not required to carry other people’s emotions; they are not yours!”
- Haines will always be here. “The world is big, go see it!” she said. “Home is always going to be here to come back to.
- You can always make new homes in other places. “It all comes back to finding your people, creating a community of friends within a community you feel part of,” she said. “Haines can still be a home among many.”
- You are important. “You are special. You matter. You are necessary. You are deeply cared about and you are very deeply loved,” she said. “Now, go show the rest of the world.”
A first for the school
Some people have worn regalia for graduation in the past, but Principal Boron said she believes Koowatlíel Douglas Adams’ was the only to wear only his regalia and no part of the school’s traditional cap and gown requirement.
Adams, who is Raven and Land Otter from The Looking House in Klukwan, wore a beaded-raven tunic along with a headdress his grandmother, Ruth Kasko, made for him when he was born.
“This wasn’t mine, it was my great-uncle Smitty [Katzeek’s],” said Adams after the ceremony. “My mom here and my great-grandma Ruth helped make this tunic here for him. One of the few times I got to see him smile before he passed away, one of the pictures was he was smiling at Celebration wearing this tunic and I thought it would be a cool thing.”
Adam said when he asked the school at the beginning of the year if he could graduate in his regalia, staff was fully supportive.
“They all accepted it and loved the idea and they just went with it,” he said. “I didn’t get any pushback, it was all leeway. They said you only graduate once.”
Xeetlee Denise Morris, Adams’ mother, said she was in tears watching him graduate.
“He’s my baby,” she said.
