Why Graduation Was Moved to the Badlands
The bleachers that normally hold SJHHS’ students at football games, will now be used to hold parents watching their children receive their diplomas.
March 11, 2019
SJHHS has been holding graduation at the UCI Bren Center for the past couple years however, this year it was announced that graduation will now be held at The SJHHS Badlands Stadium.
Starting last year, the Bren Center chose to accommodate University High School and Northwood High School graduations on the same day of SJHHS’. Since the changes didn’t dramatically effect SJHHS, administration chose to continue at the venue.
But these accommodations moved graduation to 7:00 pm, it was a bit of a time crunch for students who wanted to go to Grad Night and celebratory dinners.
The prevent the same timing issues that were experienced last year, SJHHS worked with the Bren Center on trying to get an earlier start time for the Class of 2019’s graduation, but ultimately was given 7pm as the only option.
According to a new UC policy, if a large event, such as a graduation, is taking place while school is still in session, they have to look at the impact the event will have for the students. This makes a later graduation mandatory so UCI can have a clear campus, and allow for events to run smoothly.
Because the Bren Center is such a unique venue, there was no other place that SJHHS could find that could truly accommodate the amount of people attending, in an environment that’s similar to the Bren.
“There’s definitely pros and cons. The Bren Center is super easy… We pay money and we show up. Now [Valderrama] has to rent everything and set it all up. It’s a lot more work for us…” says SJHHS principal, Jennifer Smalley.
The CUSD district alots $25,000 a year per high school graduation. The Bren Center was about $6,000 over budget, and that money would be taken out of gift funds. SJHHS will now be able to fall in the $25,000 budget, and will now have money to use on things such as extra bleachers, a better sound system, outside security etc…
“[Seniors] have been here for four years. [They’re] going to graduate on campus. I think that will be so much more meaningful… and we’re going to make it amazing,” says Activities Director, Brooke Valderrama.
SJHHS received lots of backlash from students raging about the negative aspects of the Bandland graduation, wanting to cancel Grad Night and move graduation back to the Bren. Ultimately, over 300 students have signed a contact and have paid to attend Grad Night so cancellation is not an option.
“The kids going to Grad Night would not make it. It just wouldn’t happen,” Valderrama says.
Many students were outraged over that fact that none of the students got a say in the decision.
“Student voice is so important, but then do you let the kids vote every year? Or you have kids vote and it’s one of the years you don’t get the Bren Center? Cause that’s really hard to plan, every year a new location,” said Smalley.
Another large concern amongst students was the weather. More specifically, the potential heat that could over power this special ceremony. June weather in Southern California can be unpredictable, but there will be a full snack bar, refreshments, and first aid in case there are any emergencies.
As for parking, another large concern, each student gets a parking spot, and the remaining spots will be raffled off. Anyone who doesn’t get a spot has the option to park off site, and take a shuttle that is being offered.
There will be 3 shuttles running back and forth from Ladera Ranch Middle School, and 3 from the Esencia K-8 School.
In 2014, the last time SJHHS held graduation at the Badlands, just 3 shuttles from Ladera Ranch accommodated everyone attending. Administration thought that adding 3 more shuttles and another site would make everything easier for the families.
There will be 4,500 seats, with the help of extra bleachers, and that is predicted to be a comfortable amount of seating for the number of attendees. Each student starts out with 5 free tickets to graduation, additional tickets will be $10 and sold in 3 different rounds through April 15th to May 3rd.
“I [am] so confident, having done the graduation in 2014, and it went extremely well. It was awesome. That’s so comforting for me to know, we can pull this off and it’s gonna be good for [the students],” said Valderrama.
Although many students are still not thrilled about the news, some are beginning to see the positive aspects to the shocking news.
Weston Eichner • Oct 2, 2019 at 3:42 PM
To me, I feel like graduating where we learned for the past four years is the best thing for the end of high school. San Clemente has done it on their field every year, so getting tips from them would be very helpful. Graduation pictures would be great with the setting of the school in the background so we can remember how amazing it was at San Juan Hills. Traffic was terrible at my sister’s graduation at UCI, even leaving an hour early prior to the start didn’t allow me or my father to see my sister get her diploma on stage. Not sure why students are complaining about graduating on campus, the past four years are what brought us to that moment.
Olivia • Mar 12, 2019 at 11:46 AM
Nice work Lucy, but it doesn’t make anyone happier. The seniors are upset that they didn’t get a say in their own graduation, nothing Smalley or V tell us will make us less upset that we don’t get the graduation we’ve been looking forward to for four years. Bravo on the article girl
anon • Mar 11, 2019 at 9:05 PM
Lucy, this is a good article, but I’m still pissed over the fact that we’re graduating at school. How is a snack bar and first aid going to help with the immense heat that we’ll be sitting in? Sure, families can have water bottles to help them out, but does the inside of their throat have to suffer the sunburns that my families neck, back, shoulders and any other visible skin will be? Water does the very bare minimum in protection against the heat. Not only this, but how is a snack bar and first aid going to help the ones graduating, like myself. We can’t just stand up and walk across the field to go buy ourselves a bag of nuts and a water bottle. Some may be thinking, “Wow, chill, Anon! There is a thing called sunscreen.” No, sir/ma’am, it’s going to take a whole bottle of sunscreen to save me against the beaming hundred degree weather. Again, thinking about the students graduating, we can’t necessarily douse ourselves in sunscreen if we want our pictures to look okay (because they definitely won’t look good with the sweat dripping down our foreheads). The only thing that’s going to make me happy about graduation being at SJHHS is if they’re is air conditioning, which is impossible for an outdoor football field, so I guess I’ll forever be dissatisfied with my final times at SJHHS. Another issue that I can’t help but focus on is the parking and the shuttles. Yes, it’s cool that each senior is guaranteed one spot, but I went to the 2014 ceremony and it was absolutely horrible. One, my family had never really been in Ladera, and everything looks the same there with all their roundabouts and Dr. Seuss-like-houses, so it was hard for us to navigate, two, we weren’t sure where the shuttles were picking up because there was no signs, just a bunch of people huddled in a circle trying to figure out where to go, and, three, I have a big family and we can’t really separate parents from kids, so we had to always let people go in front of us because we didn’t make the cut and we had to wait for the next one which adds to the probability of us getting horrible seats. More seating? That’s great, I’m glad that we’ll have enough money to accommodate a large crowd, but that doesn’t eliminate the fact that there will be crappy seating all the way at the top with blocked visuals because of the ones carrying umbrellas. Overall, it’s safe to say that, thinking about both myself on the field, and my family up at the bleachers, I am 100% against graduation at the Badlands. Mail me my diploma, please.
Esmeralda • Mar 11, 2019 at 5:53 PM
why are tickets so expensive? if we are staying within the budget, shouldn’t tickets be $5 as opposed to $10??