LAKELAND - The graduation ceremony might be virtual, but the grad caps for hundreds of students graduating Portage College classes on June 5 will be real.
An army of staff have been working to organize a COVID-minded event, including what will be a COVID-minded assembly line of items to fill graduation packages for each of the college's graduating students. The packages, complete with caps and tassles, certificates and other grad essentials will soon be been assemble and mailed out with the best interests of students ... and pandemic protocols ... in mind.
"We didn't just want to put things in an envelope and send them. We didn't want to risk our students' health by just packing and sending them in the mail. We thought that any of it could be contaminated," said Portage College spokesperson Jaime Davies, "so we'll have all the items out and the leave them out for days, the cap, scroll ... We also wanted to package everything nicely. We'll put them into a nice box. We wanted something special for the students — something nice to open, like a celebration in a box."
Davies said faculty and staff realize the significance of student graduations, and empathize with this year's graduating students who won't get the traditional ceremony due to the COVID-19 pandemic restrictions of all large event gatherings. Post-secondary and high school graduation ceremonies across the country have been cancelled due to the pandemic restrictions.
"It is such a meaningful event. So even though it was cancelled, we had to do something," said Davies, explaining that although the pandemic has created unique difficulties and challenges, staff knew a plan had to be implemented. "We had to put ourselves into their shoes."
In total, there would have been potentially 480 pairs of shoes walking across the Portage College stage on June 5. Instead, the same amount of confirmation emails have been sent out in advance of the 480 graduation packages. College officials say the emails inform the grads of when their packages are expected to arrive, and also ask if they have any ideas that could be added to the unique graduation event. The grad packages are expected to be assembled in the middle of April and shipping will begin in early May.
Planning for the event is continuing, with the actual agenda of the day's event still being developed. Davies said the hope is to have a virtual program available on the college's website with opportunities for students to have their own videos and messages pre-recorded, along with messages from college officials and municipal leaders. Even the significant Honour Ceremony for Indigenous students wishing to receive a ceremonial eagle feather has been factored into the planning with the feather being blessed and fitted into the graduation package. Students are also expected to have virtual portals to link to teachers and other classmates linked to the event. The initial plan is to have the virtual ceremony open to any members of the public through online access.
It's a big, complicated, convoluted process — that is very important, says Davies.
"There's a lot to do, and we want to do it the best we can for the students," she said.
College officials are planning a virtual open house of Portage offerings on Wednesday May 20. The online visit to the college's several northeastern Alberta campus locations will also serve as a smaller-scale practice run for the planned June virtual event.
* This article was updated on Saturday, May 2 at noon to reflect a correction to the contents of the grad package. We have removed reference to the 'gowns' in the original article. Portage staff will include caps and scrolls in the packages, but no gowns. The author apologize for the error.
