Sikeston High School graduation, prom rescheduled

Tuesday, April 14, 2020

SIKESTON — Sikeston High School’s graduation and prom have been rescheduled for June in response to the coronavirus pandemic.

The announcement was first made during Tuesday’s regular Sikeston R-6 Board of Education’s virtual meeting which was live-streamed on YouTube.

“This is not a decision or situation that I take lightly,” Doyle Noe, head principal of Sikeston Senior High School told the school board. “I’ve thought about graduation scenarios virtually every single day and night since COVID-19 started to become more prevalent in our society.”

In addressing this topic, Noe said he collaborated with administrators from other districts and across the state through state principal associations. He also collaborated with building-level administrators as well as Superintendent Dr Tony Robinson and Assistant Superintendent of Secondary/Support Services Shannon Holifield.

“Graduation is a pinnacle of the K-12 experience, and it means a lot of different things to a lot of different people,” Noe said during the virtual meeting. “We are blessed with a diverse group of students here at Sikeston to go on to excel in many different ways after graduation. Our seniors have worked extremely hard and deserve this moment of recognition. Unfortunately, there’s no perfect answer to the situation that we are in.”

Noe said he felt it’s his responsibility to do the most good for the most students and their families.

“I believe that people will eventually need some type of closure and some type of certainty in the most of uncertain times,” Noe said. “I also believe that by leaving graduation open-ended, that there will come a point in time we are going to miss out on the opportunity to honor those students who are moving on to the next phase of their lives in areas such as the military, the workforce, trade school, collegiate responsibilities and so forth.”

Therefore, Noe said, the plan is to postpone graduation from the original May 7 date and to reschedule graduation for Thursday, June 11.

“The week of May 22, we will re-evaluate the climate and mandates set forth by local, state and federal agencies and determine what that ceremony on June 11 will look like,” he said.

If conditions have improved, the school will conduct a traditional graduation ceremony as it does each year, Noe said. If conditions do not allow for that to occur, school officials will make the decision to hold a modified ceremony on June 11, he said.

“This date allows time to pass and hope for conditions to improve to allow for a normal graduation, but it also allows us to honor the most amount of students in some form or fashion if the future is still uncertain at that point,” Noe said.

If the district does have to use a modified graduation, Noe said the first scenario would be to host an event in the Field House based on what conditions would allow.

“We would basically close the Field House or limit the amount of people that could be in the Field House for that event. That would allow people to have some type of closure to be able to see their students — whether it’s virtually or some other means – walk across the stage and actually hear their name called, receive a diploma and get a picture as well,” Noe said.

Of course, there are plusses and minuses to that format, he said.

Another format, which is currently popular, is the parade and drive-thru route, which school officials have discussed a little bit, Noe said.

In addition, Noe said, prom is rescheduled for Saturday, June 6, and school officials will also re-evaluate the ability to host that event the week of May 22.

“Later in the week, I’ll be releasing a plan of other ways we’re going to honor our seniors during the remainder of the school year,” Noe said.

A statement by Noe was also released Tuesday on the school district’s Facebook page.

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