[/caption]In past years, students have been required to pay a flat fee of $100 in order to graduate. This fee covers many grade-wide events for seniors such as class night, the senior cruise and graduation caps and gowns.
However, recently, students and faculty working with the senior class began to feel that it was too demanding to ask the students to pay such a charge.
“Our class advisors have been asking for a while if the school could be responsible for paying for the graduation rentals,” senior class president Kruti Vora said. “It’s unfair for the kids to have to pay for this fee when they’re the ones graduating.”
One of the most noticeable changes this year was switching to a different company to host the senior cruise. The company senior classes had used in the past recently changed their policies, now not allowing students to bring food onto the boat. If the class of 2013 had continued to use this company, expenses would have risen to $45 per student.
Senior class advisors looked into numerous alternatives to cut cruise expenses because the rising costs came close to being as expensive as class night. One possibility included eliminating the cruise or the dance, but class advisors did not think that students would have liked this option. A second possibility was to share the cruise, but the advisors also didn’t think that option would work.
“We contemplated going on a larger boat, but we would have had to have shared the boat with another school,” class advisor Jessica Imbornone said. “We thought the kids wouldn’t want to do that.”
Administration has agreed to pay for some of the graduation expenses, such as chair and stage rentals. The class of 2013 also used the money left over after purchasing their graduation gift to cut the cost.
“The part that I like about it is that it’s a collaboration. It’s not like students are getting something for nothing,” principal Patrick Tutwiler said. “They worked hard raising a nice sum of money. It’s not just the school giving, but rather it’s the students giving as well.”
Money fundraised from concession stand profits at football games as well as ticket sales from this year’s senior show helped bring down graduation fees to $65, a $35 decrease from years past. Approximately $15 out of this $35 fee decrease was cut by the class’s fundraising, and the remaining $20 was cut by school administration funding.
“I am not a huge fan of fees,” Tutwiler said. “We think it’s important for this fee to be affordable for everyone.”
