Graduates face fear of unknown
It would be a stretch to say it's been a while since I graduated high school.
However, since those short seven years, I have watched thousands of students end their high school chapters.
Here in the newsroom, we start looking into graduations in early April. We write every school on the board and divide the ceremonies to ensure each graduation gets its due coverage.
This year I was handed four assignments I went to ceremonies on all thee college campuses, but more recently I spent time with Mayflower's class of 2009.
As I wandered through the students preparing to move their tassels and accept their diplomas, I recognized many emotions.
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The most popular sentiment that typically runs through students from small communities, though, was the fear of change.
Coming from a small community, I saw myself in these Mayflower students. They said they were afraid of leaving behind people they have shared lunch with since kindergarten.
Just like the rest of small town Faulkner County, many of these students have not traveled too far from their homes, let alone the borders of Arkansas, so life out of Mayflower will be different.
In my personal experiences growing up in a close-knit community, it seemed that life was always how I expected it to be.
However, as I stepped out of my parents' house and into the real world, it was a wake-up call. Not many people in Conway consider this the big city but coming from Hope, that was exactly my perception..
Traveling through a maze of more than three stoplights to find the nearest Wal-Mart presented me challenges long before I cracked open my first college textbook.
Even though life in Conway has been better than I ever imagined, I don't know where I would be without that small town experience.
Many people who come from big towns don't know what it's like to grow up with the same people they sit beside in class.
And students who graduate from bigger school aren't nearly as sad to leave.
This is not to say one situation is better than the other, but in the experiences I'll soon share with Mayflower's newest graduates, small town life prepared me for what lies ahead.
The relationships, the friendships and the values instilled in me gave me a positive attitude and outlook on life as I ventured into the scary unknown.
Sure, not everything will go exactly as these graduates plan and there will be bumpy points along the road, but they will always have a place to call home and they will know exactly where they came from.
Good luck to the graduates who call every place from Conway to Enola their home.
The education your schools have provided and the values your community shared will work together to take you wherever you want to go.
(Staff writer Jessica Bauer can be reached by e-mail at jessica.bauer@thecabin.net or by phone at 505-1236. To comment on this and other stories in the Log Cabin, log on to www.thecabin.net. Send us your news at www.thecabin.net/submit)