Once again we in Happy Valley find ourselves about to be under siege in what is always a final chaotic weekend of the school year. The onslaught is upon us. For those who enjoy the slower pace of summer life here this is the storm before the calm.
As students move out of their dorms and apartments for the summer, the families of this weekend’s graduates also are coming into town for a whole slate of graduation ceremonies lasting all weekend.
The hectic convergence of so many people in town for the complex schedule of moving out and a rolling schedule of commencement ceremonies is a fairly recent phenomenon.
Going back just a few years, move-out weekend was right after finals and graduation was a week later. That seven-day lag was affectionately known as “Senior Week.” What Senior Week did was three-fold. It avoided the congestion of combining move out and graduation weekends. The separation of the two weekends created two smaller “events” from a planning standpoint.
Senior Week also gave graduating seniors a chance to focus on their exams and papers in finals week, and gave professors more time to grade papers and tests before posting final grades. Those seniors had a few days after they completed their academic work to make sure that friends and family coming into town knew what was happening and when.
Senior Week also gave those about to graduate time to relax from finals and have time with friends and to deepen their connection to each other and to Penn State. Yes, some of those graduates likely went out every night to celebrate. But let’s remember those students are over 21, and they are going to establishments that monitor intoxication levels as responsibly as they can. The seniors would spend money in local businesses in what would normally be a dead week.
Above all, Senior Week adds memories that will remain the rest of their lives, memories painting their Penn State days with a few final happy brush strokes to complete their collegiate masterpiece. There is a long-range effect of Senior Week as well. The better their college experience and the stronger the bonds they have to their school and classmates, the more likely they are to return as alumni and to be philanthropic to Penn State.
Beyond Senior Week, there have been other springtime changes at Penn State. Going back to the 1970s and early 1980s graduation weekend was even later.
When Penn State was on the quarter system, school didn’t start until mid to late September and classes ran until June. Graduation was in mid-June, and with the better weather the graduation weekend allowed a single commencement ceremony in Beaver Stadium.
For most of those years the spring term lingered to summer’s doorstep in Happy Valley. Even the Blue-White game was held the first weekend in May. The quarter system gave students more time here with warmer days and a graduation that stood apart.
I’m not advocating a return to the quarter system. The reality is that the calendar is now designed to maximize the university’s ability to have the most advantageous summer course schedule possible. That summer schedule garners significant use of campus facilities to maximize summer revenue.
But for those who live here and who love the youthful vibe the students give Happy Valley, there will be a tinge of regret next week walking around campus. The school is so beautiful, and it is so empty without the students.
The flowers are in bloom, the ducks are in the water by the Alumni Center, the leaves are bursting forth from the trees and the elms have a bright green hue. The sunlight casts a glow on the dew-covered mornings that often smell of freshly-cut grass. You can’t help but wish that the students could be here just a few more weeks to see the wonder that we see.
While that may never change, perhaps one thing that could be pulled from the past is a big, unifying commencement ceremony.
Each spring, when seeing commencement speeches at schools across the country, there is some envy. There is a wish that Penn State had that one commencement ceremony in Beaver Stadium to bring the entire class and university community together one last time.
Sure there would some controversy over who is selected to speak, but we can get past that.
Re-instituting a university-wide commencement ceremony after a Senior Week gives everyone a chance to unite, congratulate each other and remember this: although we come from different places, diverse backgrounds and graduate in a wide array of disciplines we will always be bound by the idea that, for as long as we all live, We Are Penn State.
