It’s graduation weekend for the seniors of Traverse City Area Public Schools (TCAPS) and Grand Traverse Area Catholic Schools (GTACS). To mark the occasion, The Ticker tells the story of Traverse City’s “Class of 2019.”

TCAPS will graduate 689 students across its three high schools this weekend. Traverse City High School was up first: the school’s 32 graduating seniors were honored at a ceremony last night at Lars Hockstad Auditorium. Commencement ceremonies for Traverse City Central High School and West Senior High will follow Sunday at Interlochen’s Kresge Auditorium. Central’s Class of 2019 includes 291 graduates; West’s class is made up of 366 students (both classes are smaller than last year).

GTACS has 95 graduates this year and will also hold its commencement ceremony on Sunday. 

Here’s a closer look:

Academic Achievements
Of TCAPS’ 689 2019 graduates, 243 earned Presidential Education Awards, 240 achieved Magna Cum Laude or Summa Cum Laude standards, and 339 won Academic Honor Awards. Presidential Education Awards go to students who meet the criteria laid forth by the U.S. Department of Education. TCAPS considers students with cumulative GPAs between 3.5 and 3.749 as “Magna Cum Laude,” while students with GPAs of 3.75 or better earn the “Summa Cum Laude” designation.

The TCAPS graduating classes boast five National Merit Finalists: Matthew Failor, Lukas Hazen-Bushbaker, Edward Roe, and Massimo Vozza from Central High School; and Ian Beck from West Senior High. Of those finalists, Failor was selected to receive a $2,500 National Merit Scholarship. Of the 1.6 million students who entered the 2019 National Merit Scholarship program, approximately 15,000 were named finalists and only about 7,500 earned scholarships.

In total, TCAPS graduates earned more than $4.1 million in university scholarships and $93,600 in local scholarships.

At St. Francis, nearly half of this year’s graduates (46 percent) met the GTACS Summa Cum Laude standard, which requires a 3.8 GPA or higher. According to Beth Maday, the school’s guidance counselor, 30 percent of the graduating class is finishing high school with a 4.0 GPA or higher.

Post-Grad Plans
Christine Guitar, head of PR for TCAPS, indicates that students’ post-grad plans are quite diverse this year. The usual in-state college destinations are still popular, with Northwestern Michigan College, Michigan State University, Michigan Tech, Grand Valley State University, and the University of Michigan making up the top five. Guitar says 18 students from West Senior High alone are headed to U of M in the fall. At GTACS, the majority of students are planning to attend colleges in-state, and with MSU and U of M ranking as the two most popular destinations.

However, the Class of 2019 also seems to be breaking a few conventions. According to Maday, a full 25 percent of St. Francis graduates will be going to out-of-state – “a big number for us,” she says. TCAPS graduates, meanwhile, are going to school as far away as O’ahu (the University of Hawai’i at Manoa), with other out-of-state destinations including Penn State, University of Vermont, and The George Washington University in Washington, D.C. Some students are opting for trade schools or vocational programs (one TCAPS student is headed to the Tulsa Welding School in Oklahoma). Two GTACS grads have spots at the United States Military Academy at West Point, while TCAPS has graduates bound for the U.S. Air Force Academy.

Graduation Ceremonies
The weekend’s schedule for Traverse City high school commencement ceremonies is as follows:
·      Traverse City Central High School: Sunday from 1-3pm at Interlochen’s Kresge Auditorium
·      St. Francis High School: Sunday at 3pm in the St. Francis gymnasium
·      Traverse City West Senior High: Sunday from 6-8pm at Interlochen’s Kresge Auditorium