Camas seniors to have in-person graduations

The Camas School District said this week it will celebrate its 2021 high school graduates with in-person commencement ceremonies in early June.

“We’re really excited about it,” Camas School District Assistant Superintendent Charlene Williams told Camas School Board members during the Board’s Monday, May 24 meeting. “We have gone through several iterations of what this could look like — from last year’s drive-up ceremony to (the in-person celebrations) and every iteration in between.”

Camas High School will host a commencement ceremony at 7 p.m. Friday, June 11, at Doc Harris Stadium. Camas High graduates will each receive four tickets for guests.

“We had (to limit it to) four tickets per graduate, since we have over 500 seniors graduating and … physical distancing is required,” Williams said.

Hayes Freedom High School graduates will celebrate their commencement at 2 p.m. Saturday, June 12. The Hayes Freedom graduation ceremony also will be held at Doc Harris Stadium. Since the school is much smaller than Camas High, Williams said Hayes Freedom graduates will each receive 12 tickets for the commencement.

Attendees at both events will be required to wear face coverings and physically distance due to the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic.

Williams added that the district will need to add a third commencement ceremony in 2022, when Discovery High will celebrate its first graduating class.

“We’re looking forward to a great ceremony,” Williams said.

Washougal seniors also will celebrate their high school graduation in-person this year. That school district announced earlier this month that it will host a graduation ceremony “rain or shine” at Fishback Stadium in Washougal on Saturday, June 12.

“We’re really excited about it,” Washougal High School principal Sheree Clark said about the planned in-person graduation ceremony for the class of 2021. “We’re being cautious about it, but we also understand that people want to have a graduation outdoors. We’re definitely taking all the mitigating factors (into consideration) to make sure that it’s safe. But we’re trying to make sure that we have as much there that would be at a traditional graduation as possible.”

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