As cap and gown order forms were distributed early last month, I felt mixed emotions.  Rather than the typical feelings of sadness associated with the end of high school, I was upset that I may not be able to attend my own graduation.  Due to the new schedule implemented this year, graduation falls on the Sunday of Memorial Day Weekend.  A potential rationale behind this selected date was that students and teachers alike would not have to return to school after Memorial Day.  The assumption was that people would be able to attend graduation because it would be on the Sunday of a holiday weekend, a time when many people would not have work.

The selected date and time pose many obstacles. For Christians who attend a morning mass, graduation at noon poses a dilemma.  They must choose between their religious obligations and the graduation ceremony.  For those who frequently vacation during Memorial day weekend, their plans must be altered or cancelled altogether.  This creates an inconvenience for both students and teachers. Not only seniors and their families, but also students who play in the band, and our faculty, must spend their holiday weekend stuck in Chicago.

However, the conflict that is personally causing me aggravation is the fact that this year’s graduation and the Jewish holiday of Shavuot overlap.  Since before the school year began, a few friends and I realized that we may not even be able to attend our own high school graduation.

For those of you who are unaware, there are certain limitations when observing the Jewish Sabbath or Jewish holidays. Religious Jews cannot drive on the sabbath or on holidays, and cannot use any electronic devices.

My family and I would have to walk almost six miles round-trip to attend graduation. While that may not seem like such a terrible thing, let’s not forget that we live in Chicago. There is absolutely no consistency in the weather, meaning that any extreme weather conditions would eliminate my participation altogether.

When this issue was brought before the board of education, they quickly decided that there was nothing that could be done. Even though graduation was more nine months away, they were not able to change the date. And while we are still working towards a solution, my participation in graduation will definitely be limited.

No student should be placed in a position where they cannot attend their graduation because of the observance of a religious duty.  Throughout my high school years I have missed numerous school functions due to the fact that they conflicted with Jewish holidays or the Jewish Sabbath. While I understand I go to a public school, I never imagined there would be such a conflict between a holiday and a milestone event. Of all of the school events conflicting with the observance of Jewish traditions, it never occurred to me that our district would place our graduation on a Jewish holiday. This was the one event I anticipated with excitement. The one event I thought for sure would not be on a Saturday or any other holiday. Our district prides itself on the diversity, but in this situation failed to honor it.  Even though there are only a few religious students, don’t we still count?  What happened to the saying “We Are One”?