Santa Maria High Schools return to different graduation times

The Santa Maria Joint Union High School District has decided to go back to holding staggered graduations for students.

Graduations were held simultaneously the past two years at three different locations.

“We’re excited to go to college.. and leave.. and seeing our other friends graduate from other schools now,” Yahaira Ibarra – Righetti High School Senior Yahaira Ibarra said.

This change coming after students and parents expressed frustration that they couldn’t attend the other graduation ceremonies if they had family members graduating at other schools. Some families saying they were put in a position where they had to choose between which family members they were going to see graduate.

“I have friends at PV that are seniors and I’d like to go see them graduate too,” Senior Carolina Salazar said.

Two years ago the school district went to holding all the graduations at the same time because of safety concerns and the murders taking place in the city. They wanted to get the graduations over quickly and before sundown.

“Honestly I really like it, I think it’s an awesome thing that they’re doing that,” Junior Isaac Palacio said.

Here are this years schedule for graduations for Righetti, Santa Maria and Pioneer Valley on June 8th:

Righetti HS: 9:30 a.m.

SM HS: 11:30 a.m.

PV HS: 1:30 p.m.

KCOY 12’s Sean Larsen will have reaction from people during his reports at 5 and 6 pm.