LIVERMORE FALLS — After a wet morning, the rain let up for most of the Spruce Mountain High School graduation Sunday afternoon, June 9. Tents were assembled over the stage and band areas while tarps covering the seats where the seniors were to sit had to have puddles poured off before they could be removed. Custodians and other staff spent time dumping water out of seats before toweling them off so staff and guests could attend the commencement exercises.

“Lovely day, just like a football game, right,” Sally Boivin said before the ceremony. She noted the flowers in front of the podium were from Baccalaureate night. “Every kid brings a flower, that is how they make the bouquet,” she explained.

Drummers led the graduating class from the former Livemore Falls High School to Griffin Field where Anna Plourde and Hailey Jackson, class marshals led the processing seniors to their seats.

In his welcome, Principal Thomas Plourde thanked faculty, office and custodial staff for preparing the graduation ceremony.

“This is your day,” he told the seniors. “This is the time to celebrate and recognize the hard work and dedication you have put into your years of public-school education.” He asked them to think about the firsts they experienced throughout their education journey and how it passed like a blink of an eye. You will remember this day for your entire life. All of you will remember it with the rain.”

The next chapter starts today for the Class of 2024, Plourde noted. Take risks, start a new adventure and make adult decisions, he encouraged.

“Please be passionate about your aspirations,” he stressed. “Be compassionate with your family friends, co-workers, and your leaders. You have shown the faculty, staff, and community that strong leadership, perseverance, and dedication have made your goal worthwhile. We are so proud of you and hope for the best in your new adventure.”

Senior Brooklyn Fournier, who is entering the United States Army was recognized.

Faith Maurais, valedictorian and class president spoke of the Class of 2024 starting as freshman during the COVID-19 pandemic and hybrid learning. “We spent countless hours studying and working for four years and today we get to see all of that hard work pay off,” she noted. “There were many tears, many hard lessons, but many beautiful moments. The one thing we can all say though is that the road hasn’t been easy, but we have fought through it together and it has all led to this one beautiful moment.”

When facing challenges in the future, Maurais hoped her classmates would remember her next few words, “Everything you will ever face in life can be overcome by a change of mindset. I have learned that the amount of effort you put into something is what you get out of it. When the road gets hard, you have to not focus on what is hard about it.  Just remember how far you have come and try not to focus on how far you have to go. Think of the next step.”

Mindset is about understanding that it is okay to ask for help, she stated. “It is also about understanding that it’s also okay to fail,” she continued. “There are some things in life that you can not change, but it is up to you to grow and change your mindset when you think of how they control you. Your mistakes, your imperfections, your anxieties, your depression, your fear and your trauma does not define you. So don’t let it. It is important to not create a mindset for yourself that you must always succeed, because it is often in our moments of failure that we have the most growth.”

Don’t focus on the end of this journey but the beginning of the next one, Maurais said. “Change your mindset from believing that you may let others down to thinking of how you can bring yourself up to the next level.”

She shared a mantra that has helped her, “When life feels impossible, look back and see that you have done the “impossible” before.” “When you start saying to yourself “I can’t do this, this is literally impossible,” think of all of the times you have said that about a situation and think of how you have gotten through them one way or another every time,” Maurais said. “If you change your mindset, you can achieve the impossible.”

Class marshal Hailey Jackson and Maurais then performed ‘When we were young’ by Adele.

Leah Burgess, salutatorian spoke of having to capture the entire audience and include things everyone can relate to when preparing a graduation speech. “When I started to think about this, the most obvious of all came to mind, but it is the most telling about why and how every single one of us is here today,” she said. “We grew up.”

“We yearned to be older, wiser, stronger,” Burgess said. “We grew up anxiously waiting for the bell to ring at the beginning and end of each period, then rushing off to games, practices, work, or quite literally anywhere but school.”

The seniors grew up facing unforeseen difficulties which made them stronger and more resilient, Burgess said. “Through experiencing the unknowns of COVID during our first year of high school, multiple anxiety-inducing weapon threats disturbing our days in the classroom, the flooding and destruction of community roads and buildings that connect us, and the tragic losses of family members and classmates, our class has faced it all while still maintaining the end goal of reaching this day,” she said.

What seniors did not realize, Burgess said, was how fast they were growing up: the whole 13 years flew by and now those days had come to the very end. “The growing we did through every second of these years was beautiful,” she said. “We grew up making cherished memories that will last a lifetime.”

Burgess then shared three lessons learned to move into the future:

• These 13 years have flown by. Live in the moment to slow time down.

• Mistakes and failure will happen. Use them as fuel to do better, learn from them.

• Life’s path is not linear. Take moments of vulnerability and change to become stronger achievers of goals.

Plourde certified the diplomas, which were then presented to the 75 graduating seniors.

Maurais led the turning of the tassels, first saying, “Congratulations Class of 2024. We made it!”

Plourde called attention to scholarship recipients listed in the program. “Each year I am blown away by this community and the generosity they show for our graduates,” he said. “This year our students received over $350,000. Our community is a very giving community.”