Excessive Celebration - Coffee and Prozac

In the NFL when a player displays behavior that can be described as excessive celebration they can be fined and the team levied a 15 yard penalty on the following play.

In Galesburg Illinois if the friends and relatives of a high school graduate cheer during the commencement ceremony the graduate can be denied their high school diploma.

Lou Holtz once said that he did not want to see his players celebrating after they scored a touchdown. It was his belief that he wanted them to act like they had been there before.

A player has several opportunities during a season to score a touchdown. A student has one opportunity to graduate from high school.

Graduating from high school is the culmination of more than 12 years of studies. This is not an every day event. It is a once in a lifetime event.

When I graduated from high school there was one particular student who despite a life long handicap received his diploma. The crowd and the students gave him a well deserved standing ovation. It was a special moment. Before that ceremony the school principal asked that everyone hold their applause until afterwards. No one did and no one was penalized.

I am fairly certain that the applause police that were monitoring the crowd do not know the stories of most of those students. They probably do not know what it took for those students to get to that stage. It very well may have been worthy of applause. Their graduating may have very well been a source of great joy and pride for their families.

When an athlete hits a home run or sinks a three pointer people cheer because they did something good. They do not wait until after the game. I consider completing 12 years of education something good. Something worthy of cheers.

One Indianapolis administrator, Clarke Campbell, referred to graduation as a “solemn occasion”. From m-w.com we find the definition of solemn to be “1 : marked by the invocation of a religious sanction 2 : marked by the observance of established form or ceremony; specifically : celebrated with full liturgical ceremony 3 a : awe-inspiring : SUBLIME b : marked by grave sedateness and earnest sobriety c : SOMBER, GLOOMY” Using these definitions the crowning of a king would be a solemn occasion, a funeral would be a solemn occasion, but certainly not a high school graduation.

A high school graduation is worthy of cheers, applause, and yes a certain level of decorum. But penalizing a student by denying them their diploma for excessive celebration by their family is ludicrous, insensitive and completely without compassion.

The school administrators involved in the Galesburg incident two of whom are Joel Estes, assistant superintendent and Tom Chiles, the principal can hold their ground on what they deem to be a matter of such great personal importance but in the end their efforts will be futile. No one will honor or respect them for standing up for what they think is right and just when their cause is excessive celebration at a high school graduation.

Respect is reserved for people who fight wars, fight cancer or fight hunger. Not for people who deny high school graduates their diplomas because their family expressed their joy.

Apparently the students can still obtain their diploma by completing 8 hours of public service work. I encourage them not to. They met the requirements for getting their diploma. Unfortunately their school administrators do not possess the dignity necessary to honor that fact.

The administrators did however leave them with some very important life lessons. Life is not fair, and not all people who will be in a position to make decisions that affect their life will be intelligent, sensible or compassionate.

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