Written by MSTA President Lana Moore
Two more weeks… two more weeks… hang on for two more weeks…
Have you ever been in a situation where you are counting down the days until an event happens that you have anticipated for several months? Well, for the senior students, that time is here. The season of “senioritis” has set in; that time of pure adrenaline mixed with heavy nostalgia.
High school and college graduations are happening, and those graduates will have accomplished a great feat. The years of hard work and angst will be over, and the world will be at their beck and call. No more having to sit in class listening to an instructor pass on information to memorize, and no more exams to worry about passing. It will be smooth sailing… for about a week. Then reality hits. The calendar is blank, the structure of the past 13 years has suddenly disappeared, and we find that “cage” was instead, a community.
Feeling the loss of lives being measured in 50-minute increments for over a decade can be jarring when we, as students, don't anticipate that feeling, and the long-sought-after “freedom” can feel a bit heavy. The “exams” will just get weirder as an adult, like having to answer, “Why is my check engine light on?” or “How do I file taxes when I have three jobs?” That “senioritis” brings that soul-deep readiness to meet the world, along with the stark realization that the world is a very big empty field waiting to swallow us up.
In my district, seniors gather at the football stadium at the beginning of the year for “Senior Sunrise” while the world is still dark, and together they watch as the sun peeks out from the horizon, symbolizing the beginning of their final year together and the start of new adventures. Games are played, conversations are held, friendships rekindled and solidified.
At the end of the year, seniors once again gather on the stadium grounds at the close of an evening to watch the sun descending for “Senior Sunset,” symbolizing the ending of their journeys as high school students and honoring what could possibly be their last time together as a group before graduation, or even their last time altogether. It is a bittersweet event, turning what some would have thought of “just leaving school” into a meaningful rite of passage, and those conversations on the turf are what stick when the courage to say what you haven’t said yet is shared.
High school is a shared struggle, but sharing it is what makes it bearable. We all remember complaining about something from our school days, whether it was having to walk uphill both ways in a blizzard, carrying a baked potato to keep our hands warm, eating said potato for lunch, then freezing on the way home, still uphill both ways. However, those things we complained about are what we miss the most because they were shared experiences. We miss the common enemy, whether it was a difficult class that glued friendships together, or the toughest teacher.
Professors we felt were hardest, taught lessons we remembered longest. Educators who made us feel valued generate the fondest of memories. We remember the friendliness of the office staff, the janitors, the cooks, our bus drivers, and wish we could revisit just one more time the security we felt of being watched over, cared for, and fed.
Our one-room schoolhouse teacher mother would say that at graduation, we find we are a very small fish in a very big pond. Graduation is the greatest equalizer of all. Those who thought they were “hot snot” (a phrase from times long gone), find they are at the bottom of the heap right along with everyone else once that stage is crossed and the tassel is moved from one side of the precariously perched mortar board to the other.
It is a big, messy, unstructured world, but the high school seniors have spent 13 years practicing for it, one 50-minute block at a time. For families with seniors, both high school and college, tell them, “Well done! The world awaits!”
But on the other side of the desk, what of the teachers left behind in the wake of the storm? What does their world look like when the chaos of the halls quiets, and former charges are now on their own?
We have worked hard the past 180 days as mentors, cheerleaders, buffers, sometimes as surrogate parents, to instill a sense of belonging in our students. We attempt to express knowledge they will need for the big world and responsibilities we know will snare our students once they have left our tutelage, knowing we have done our best, and pray we left a positive and lasting impact.
Educators across the ages rejoice in watching the amazing adults former students become. We mourn those whose life decisions veer from the straight and narrow, and those taken from us too soon. It is a constant cycle of celebration and heartbreak, seeing which way our investments turn. We won’t always get the payoff of seeing the results of our investments immediately. It may be five or ten years down the line when a former student reaches out. We may never hear from them, but we know they have taken a piece of our hearts.
That immediate sensation of silence feels heavy. Scanning the emptiness of the classroom, we don’t just see furniture, we see the souls who filled the seats, hear the whispers, smile at the memories of that one kid who always had some comment we tried to appear angry at, but inside were attempting so desperately to stifle the laugh.
For the past school year, educators and staff have been the anchors holding the students' ships close to harbor. For some of us, it may feel we have been left behind on the dock when their ships have finally pulled up anchor and have been allowed to sail. It takes an incredible amount of emotional resilience to love a group enough to let them go and have the heart to do it all over again the following year.
But when we watch the sails drifting off in the distance to discover new worlds, we find ourselves preparing the lighthouse for the next fleet to sail into our port.
That final burst of energy to finish the year strong after pouring so much of ourselves into others brings such a sense of exhaustion. The emotional and physical decompression that the public rarely sees is real. The recovery mode is real. Ending the chaotic, high-energy environment is as jarring for educators as the blank calendar is for students.
And then we begin to prepare for the next year, and become excited to do it all over again. That is what caring educators and dedicated staff do.