This year’s graduation ceremony, which has been held the past couple of years at Arizona State University’s Desert Financial Arena, has been moved to the Perry football stadium after a vaccination distribution site was relocated to the arena. 

Since COVID-19 has been a very big obstacle in the graduation planning process, and staff members have been working out a safe and functional way to hold the ceremony on campus. “It will be a full traditional ceremony obviously we will maintain the social distancing and we will have the masks but it won’t be as informal as it was last year,” said Assistant Principal Heather Patterson.

Senior Natalie Christofolo is looking forward to the ceremony. “Yes I am excited that it is a traditional graduation. I would feel like I didn’t truly complete high school without it, so I am very grateful it will be normal,” she explained. 

Another obstacle that was proposed was the issue of spectators not being allowed to come watch their graduate. The ceremony’s relocation now allows for spectators in the stands. Four audience members will be allowed per student, and seniors will receive four wristbands in their english class. Family and friends who are unable to attend in-person can watch the ceremony live streamed on Perry365.

The decision to hold a traditional in-person graduation concludes a year defined by back and forth online and in-person classes and senior events being cancelled. “[Graduating during a pandemic] means for me personally that I persevered through probably one of the hardest times to be in high school right now, at a time where high school has been ten times harder than it has been and not just academically but emotionally and physically too,” explained senior Corinna Evancic. She continued to sum up: “It’s a sense of relief.”

The in-person traditional graduation will be held at 7 pm on May 26.