Congratulations Stevens High Class of 2018

By BILL CHAISSON
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CLAREMONT – The Class of 2018 entered the Carr Gymnasium at Stevens High School with impressive precision. They seemed used to working together as a group. The class of 103 students took their seats at the front of the packed room and waited. 

Principal Patricia Barry introduced Superintendent Middleton McGoodwin, who took the opportunity to tell the audience that just as many students would be leaving Claremont, so would he. “Sometimes we feel that we have hit some bumps in the road,” he said, “and you feel as if you are getting nowhere, not getting done what needs to be done.” But, he advised, look at ‘nowhere’ a different way. Think of it as “I am ‘now here’” and get on with  your life.

Co-chair of the SAU 6 school board Rebecca Zullo advised the students to always make rules for themselves and to “define your own greatness.”

The two salutatorians, Aidan Cahill and Elyse Scott, and the valedictorian Drew Grenier were all showered with praise by those who introduced them. In all cases the introductions were longer than the actual speeches made by the students.

In a portion of the ceremony that perhaps summed up the zeitgeist of Claremont perfectly, senior Adelyn Nelson sat down at a battered old upright piano and played Frederic Chopin’s “Etude in A-flat Major” beautifully. 

Keynote speaker and police chief Mark Chase (Class of 1986) told the graduates, “Don’t let this be the best part of your lives. Turn the page and enter the next chapter. This book is really getting good now.”