Peters Township School District opens commencement to full attendance
The Peters Township High School Class of 2021 commencement will take place with no limits on how many people can attend.
The event is scheduled for 7 p.m. June 11 at the high school stadium. Rain dates are 10 a.m. June 12 and 12 p.m. June 13.
Superintendent Jeannine French announced the plans at Monday’s school board meeting.
“We have opened it up,” she said. “We’ll be able to accommodate all of our families who want to come in, to the greatest extent possible.”
Jennifer Murphy, deputy superintendent, provided details about the stadium’s configuration for the event.
“We’ve shifted the stage, instead of being on the 50-yard line, to an end zone, so that spectators from both sides have equal ability to be able to see the stage,” she said. “They’re changing the procession so that kids will walk past the visitor and home sides. There are a lot of different tweaks we made in that way to make sure everybody has really good seats.”
Rain dates have been scheduled because there is no provision to move commencement indoors. The stadium is at the site of the former Peters Township High School, where work is in progress to convert the building to a middle school.
Because of the construction, parking is limited and will be restricted to the former student lot and at Pleasant Valley Elementary School. Families are encouraged to use shuttles that will run from the new high school to the stadium beginning at 5:30 p.m. June 11.
Originally, families were to be allotted a limited amount of tickets for graduation. But with Gov. Tom Wolf’s announcement COVID-19 restrictions related to gatherings would be lifted as of May 31, school administrators formulated a more inclusive plan.
On Monday, the school board voted to amend the district’s health and safety plan, along with the extracurricular health and safety plan, to follow Pennsylvania Department of Education and U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention guidelines.
“What this language would allow us to do is if CDC comes out with something next week or PDE comes out with something next week, we could be more responsive to that,” French said.
The CDC announced May 13 that Americans who are fully vaccinated against COVID-19 could forgo masks both indoors and outdoors, from a health standpoint. Two days later, the agency issued a recommendation that schools continue to adhere to guidelines including mask wearing and social distancing for the few weeks remaining in the academic year, because most students have yet to receive vaccinations.
French said the CDC intends to issue “further guidance anticipating that we can significantly lift any restrictions for next school year.”
As for 2020-21, she noted the district for the most part has met the challenges presented by COVID-19.
“This board has allowed school to be open five days a week since the beginning of the school year. We’ve done it quite safely, and we’ve always followed the guidance of the CDC and PDE,” she said. “We’ve increased our occupancy limits right along, so we’re always pushing that edge to provide as much as we can for our students while still keeping everyone safe.”