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Spain Park graduating seniors remember their early days of school while Greystone Elementary students got an opportunity to meet the seniors. (For the Reporter/Dawn Harrison)

By WILLIAM MARLOW / Special to the Reporter

Spain Park High School celebrated its Class of 2021 during the school’s annual senior walk on Monday, May 24.

The event was held at Greystone Elementary School where the senior class took a visit down memory lane and visited former teachers as well as current elementary students. Greystone’s K-5 grade classes cheered the graduating seniors on as they walked.

Greystone Elementary Principal Stacey Stocks said the event is a tradition spanning back years, and that every elementary school that feeds into Spain Park High School recognizes the seniors in a similar fashion.

“It is so rewarding for our teachers to see their students all grown up and finishing high school.  It is common for the students to comment about how small things seem and how they remember the school being so much larger,” Stocks said. “Our students love to see the seniors, dressed in their caps and gowns.”

Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the walk was somewhat different compared to previous years. In the past, graduating classes would walk down the elementary school’s hallways, but the event was held outside this year in order to accommodate social distancing guidelines. The graduating seniors walked from the school’s main entrance down the sidewalk and made several loops.

Christie Kelley, a third grade teacher at Greystone Elementary, has partaken in the parade for the last several years. However, this year was especially significant because her son, Cooper, graduates this year and walked as part of the group. Kelley described the event as a bright spot in a rather challenging year.

‘Considering what teachers, students and parents have been through since last March, it was just an exciting time to see this. Hopefully, we’re headed back towards some normalcy with our lives, with students and parents getting to be a part of things that we do at school,” Kelley said. “It was really great that they got to experience this and so many of them are excited to graduate.”

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