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Graduation season is upon us, and that means commencement exercises at schools throughout Utah and across the nation. Unfortunately, in recent years, society has been witnessing what one educator insightfully described as "an incremental erosion of the solemnity" of the proceedings, especially in the high school setting.
Graduation decorum, in many instances, is pitifully compromised.
Honestly, is a commencement event really the place for inflated beach balls, prancing and gyrating graduates, and obnoxious screaming and blasts from air horns?
Yet, in far too many instances, commencement exercises have degenerated into raucous affairs with little or no decorum.
"Decorum," by the way, is defined as "propriety and good taste in conduct or appearance," and "the conventions of polite behavior."
Graduation, most certainly, is a time for celebration, when family and friends find joy in the accomplishments of those who have devoted long years to their educational pursuits. In some instances, there may be a genuine sense of relief that one has "made it" through the system. It is not a time for disrespectful rowdiness and boisterous behavior to supplant propriety, politeness and good taste.
In honoring graduates, KSL encourages educators, students and parents to earnestly strive to bring more dignity, indeed, greater decorum to the celebratory proceedings.
