Observations©

Donald S. Conkey

Date: June 7, 2007 # 923 – Etowah’s Graduation  (806)

Since our oldest daughter Pamela graduated from Dekalb County’s Towers high school in 1971 Joan and I have literally traveled thousands of miles nationwide attending the high school and university graduations of our numerous children and grandchildren.

            Until this year our graduation seats were always in the bleachers – some indoors, some outdoors, some in the sun with the sun often so hot and bright we became sun burned, and some so cold we had to wrap in blankets, and occasionally we opened our umbrellas. But we were always there to support a child or grandchild as they walked across that stage, that stage representing a new beginning to them– their walk into the real world of life, and to celebrate a new milestone achieved in their young lives..

            So when we attended the graduation exercises for our 2007 Etowah graduate, granddaughter Amanda Karski, daughter of Pamela and Philip Karski of Woodstock, along with her fellow Etowah and seminary graduate Justin Bain, son of Bob and Brenda Bain of Acworth, at Woodstock’s First Baptist Church we were pleasantly surprised to be seated in comfort – real air conditioned comfort and able to observe close up all graduation activities courtesy of First Baptist’s huge wall screens that brought the exercises to us. It was wonderful. There was even reserved for me a special wheel chair space.

            We also celebrated the graduation of Michael Ellis Kellogg, our Eagle Watch second door neighbor, the son of James and Elizabeth Kellogg.

            Our family pride was well rewarded. Granddaughter Amanda not only graduated ‘With Distinction,’ but she was a member of the Singing Seniors whose presentation of  “Time to Say Goodbye” was performed with precision and taste.    

            While watching Amanda sing and later walk across the stage my mind reminisced the day she was born, a day I shared with her in the DeKalb hospital. It was a bitter sweet day for Joan – the birth of Amanda with me being admitted following a massive heart attack, a heart attack I survived but which would lead to my medical retirement two years later.

            Continuing to follow the graduation program I found myself totally impressed with the Cherokee County School Board’s efforts in partnering with the county community, particularly in obtaining Woodstock’s huge First Baptist’s church auditorium, to obtain a venue large enough, and comfortable enough, to satisfy the invitational needs of all 362 graduates. Etowah was the first of five county schools to use this venue for their graduation exercises that day. 

            Perhaps it was ironic, perhaps not, but on the day of graduation a Tribune story indicated the Cherokee County School System was now the number one school system in the state. This was a tribute to the county school system administrative system and to the teachers who give so much of themselves to prepare our students for that world beyond graduation. No wonder families with school-aged children are anxious to move to Cherokee county and attend the county’s exceptional school system.

It’s what all families do who want the best education available for their children. My grandparents did it, my parents did it, and Joan and I did it. When our children were in school the state’s best school district was the DeKalb school system, and families were moving to DeKalb county for that school system just as families are moving to Cherokee County today. Superintendent Jim Cherry was our Dr. “P” in those days. Our children all graduated from the DeKalb school system.

This thought caused me to again reminisce. This time it was about my school days over seventy years ago, days when I walked nearly three miles to school - in good weather and bad, and I thought of the never-say-die efforts of my parents to introduce busing to a community served only by a one room eight grade school house; and of my grandparents who purchased a separate home in a school district served by the only high school in the county so their children could obtain a high school education. Dad became the first university graduate from Lake Township, Huron County, Michigan. Later, each of his four children would graduate from Michigan State University.