The past two years haven't been great for graduations. While students might not know the full importance of graduation, their parents surely do — especially if their kids are the first in the family to graduate.
Luckily, teacher Ray Gowlett had an idea of how to make the 2021 graduation ceremony at Central Algoma Secondary School, also known as CASS, very special. He constructed a stage that he was able to drive from house to house, so that every student was able to have the experience of walking across a stage to get their diploma.
Is it impractical? Maybe for high schools with large classes. But at CASS, the graduating class was a little smaller. In total, he visited 72 homes with his portable stage. The moments were caught on TikTok, and everyone is pretty impressed with Ray's handiwork and dedication.
By going to each student's home, Ray allowed the families to be there to watch the big moment happen. Also, it was probably a lot of fun, as this graduation was completely personalized. Ray teaches health and physical education, but it's possible he might be a pretty good substitute for woodshop if given the opportunity.
The post even made its way to Reddit, where more people were able to comment on Ray's genius idea. So how long did it take to build the stage? According to Ray, roughly six hours. Despite visiting dozens of homes, they were able to wrap everything up in the span of two days.
"We started Saturday at 8 a.m., and we finished Saturday at 8 p.m.," he told Insider. "And then we started again Sunday morning. Our first delivery was at 9:00 a.m., and the last one was finished at 7:30 p.m. We traveled a total of 400 kilometers."
The CASS class of 2021 attended school virtually throughout the year. Because of the health crisis, they had to miss prom and other typical senior activities. Having the portable ceremony come to their homes was a nice way to give the students something meaningful while staying safe.
Ray reportedly got the idea from his daughter Sadie, who was among the graduates. Prior to the big day, the initial plan was to simply hand students their diploma. But Sadie asked her dad if there was a way they could get a photo of the diploma while on some sort of stage.
"I asked, is it important to walk across the stage? And she said, yes, we really want to walk across the stage and get a picture with our diploma," Ray told Insider. "I said no problem. I can do that. Do you think many more people would want to do that? She said everybody would want to do that."
"I just started thinking, well, how can I get a stage to every student's house?" he continued. "And then the idea just occurred to me to build a mobile stage and bring a teacher to each person's house." When he told the grad committee about his plan, they all thought it was a wonderful idea.
So not only did the graduates get to walk across the stage and take their graduation photos, but they also got a graduation experience like no other. Just imagine having the stage come to your own home. After years of working toward a diploma, it's a nice perk.
CASS holds a special place in Ray's heart. Not only has he been teaching there for years, but he reportedly went there himself when he was a high schooler. "I was lucky enough to have the idea to build the stage, but it absolutely would not have worked without the 20 people behind the scenes doing all the paperwork and coordinating the setup and the takedown," Ray said.
While this may have been an easy assembly project for Ray, it definitely took the whole community to make it work. It's a reminder of how important teachers really are. Ray likely didn't get paid for overtime — his goal was to try to give the seniors the best final year they could have under the circumstances.
Not a lot of people have the same dedication Ray does. But it'd be a better world if they did. Thanks to him, the small graduating class will always have a fun memory as they look back at their high school years.
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