By Lea Kahn, Staff Writer
LAWRENCE — The messages on the “cardinal red” mortarboard caps worn by Lawrence High School’s Class of 2016 said it all — “Rutgers,” Villanova,” “’Cuse,” “If you are reading this, then I graduated.”
The seniors who wore those matching red caps and gowns gathered with the rest of their classmates for the last time Monday afternoon, impatiently waiting for their graduation ceremony to begin at the Sun National Bank Center.
And then the minute they had been waiting for — 3 p.m. — rolled around. Two members of American Legion Post 414’s color guard stepped out onto the arena floor, followed by the Trenton Ancient Order of Hibernians Pipe Band.
School district officials and high school faculty walked close behind. And then the seniors began their march toward adulthood, settling into the rows of folding chairs lined up neatly on the arena floor.
Senior class president Rebecca Altman welcomed the class and their family members to the ceremony. She walked them through their years in the Lawrence Township public school district, from kindergarten to 12th grade, and the changes in technology — from flip phones to Google Docs.
Lawrence High School Principal David Adam, who was presiding over his first high school graduation ceremony as principal, told the seniors that the focus of the graduation ceremony is to take time to acknowledge and celebrate the successes of their journey to this point — from academics to athletics.
“We begin the process of turning the reins of leadership over to the next generation of great leaders. Almost 90 percent of the Class of 2016 will be attending a post-secondary educational institution,” Mr. Adam said — from as nearby as Rider University and Princeton University, to colleges halfway across the country.
Mr. Adam congratulated the seniors, who are well prepared “to leave the Cardinal nest, as we like to say, and take on all of the challenges and rewards that the world has to offer,” Mr. Adam said.
Valedictorian Jane Lin told her classmates that “from kindergarten to senior year of high school, we strived for this milestone, the brink of the ‘real world.’ Each and every one of the graduates owes countless thanks to those who guided and reassured us along the tumultuous journey.”
“We aspired, steeled our determination, and strove to follow the class motto — to dream big. Each new day seemed to blur together with the one before it,” Jane said.
“Yet here we are, 13 years after the beginning of kindergarten, reminiscing and thinking, as C.S. Lewis once did, ‘Isn’t it funny how day by day nothing changes, but when you look back, everything is different,’ ” Jane said.
David Connelly, the class salutatorian, compared the seniors’ four years at Lawrence High School to “Pomp and Circumstance” — the traditional tune played by the Lawrence High School Concert Band as the graduating class takes its place on the arena floor.
“I think the lengthy, arduous process of playing graduation music for 20 minutes straight is remarkably similar to the experience of making it through high school,” said David, who played in the concert band during his four years at Lawrence High School.
High school presented a new level of scholastic intensity, David said. As freshmen, they were told that no matter what they had planned for the future, high school would be key in making it happen. There was pressure not to mess up academically — just as there was pressure on band members not to “mess up” while playing “Pomp and Circumstance” for the seniors, he said.
As the last senior takes his or her seat, the music arrives at its conclusion, David said. The finale of a piece of music such as “Pomp and Circumstance” is the most dynamic section of the work, recapitulating the melodies and moments already heard and tying them together, he said.
“This ceremony today commemorates our graduation, the finale of what has been a magnificently intricate, four-year-long symphony played by all of us in the Class of 2016. May the music we made together stay with us always,” David said.
