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Ronda Graff

Community Connections

News and views from the McCook Community Foundation Fund

Opinion

The simple ask: We want you to return home

Thursday, July 30, 2020

Anyone with more than one child knows that none of them are the same. They each have their own characteristics and their own quirks, their own way of learning and their own way of responding to a situation.

Just as every child is different, every high school class is different. Ask any teacher who has been teaching a few years about the ebb and flow of classes through a school.

But this class of 2020 will have the distinction of truly being different.

Along with everyone else, their year was upended this past spring. And while hopefully, the next class will be able to return to some sort of normalcy, the Class of 2020 will not get those opportunities back.

There was no senior celebration or senior trip. The spring sports season was lost to the history books. And there was no final chance to say goodbye to teachers and friends.

But the McCook High School Class of 2020 is fortunate to have one final hurrah with an adjusted graduation and a semblance of a prom to close out their high school career.

As the MHS Class of 2020 prepares to walk across the stage Friday evening to “officially” graduate, it will be about as normal as normal can be these days. Their name will still be read, speeches will be made and someone will sneak in an airhorn to celebrate the milestone.

But the changes to the graduation ceremony will not be missed. The stands will not be packed because of the health directives in place. There will be family members with hurt feelings because they could not be included. And there will be fewer kids in the chairs, as some have already left for the military or moved onto the next phase of their life.

If there is an upside to all this, everyone is hopefully a bit more lean and sporting a summer tan in all those graduation photos. After all, it’s the end of July. Graduation should have been two months ago when we were still trying to shed our winter fat and just unveiling our pasty white legs.

After graduation, many will take their diplomas, leave for college or a career elsewhere and never look back. Letting these kids go is a missed opportunity on our part, but one that can be easily amended.

The McCook Community Foundation Fund conducted a “youth survey” at the McCook High School this past spring, the fifth survey held over the past 20 years.

We were supposed to do follow-up conversations with the kids in April about the results, but obviously that didn’t happen. That was going to be our opportunity to have a dialogue about what they want to see in their community and how they could be involved and make that happen.

But more importantly, it was going to give us a chance to do the one thing that many adults fail to do: Ask our youth to move back to McCook.

In the survey results, nearly 65 percent of the kids said they had never been asked to stay or return to McCook.

While it may seem like a simple concept, people like to be asked. They like to feel appreciated. They like to feel valued. And that is what that question boils down to: We want our youth to move or stay in McCook because we want them to be part of our community. We want them to establish a career here. We want them to raise their families here.

As the parent of a graduating senior with a husband who has taught nearly everyone of these graduates, we have grown close to these kids and I would love to see not only my own kids but all of them stay or return to McCook.

As the McCook High School Class of 2020 prepares to graduate on Friday, we wish them nothing but the best. We want each and everyone of them to know that they are a valuable member of this community. We want them to know that they can always call McCook home. And just in case no one else told them (or they missed it during this week’s graduation practice when Tyler McCarty was supposed to be sharing that message but instead was memorably throwing shrimp at them): Class of 2020…we want you to return home to McCook and help us make this community an even better place to call home.

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