There is no need to be the “best graduating class ever.” Every high school and college graduating class is unique enough; it would be tough to compare any two to each other.
There’s no need to place one class above or below another importance of others; there’s plenty of room in history for many spectacular groups of people. No one has the market cornered on graduating classes that are filled with humans who make an impact in the world.
Jasper County high school’s classes of 2016 will be graduates at a point in history that fascinates its predecessors in several ways. Yes, each class seems to have a lot of society’s future in its hands, but many forces are coming together in the same year — technology, finance, innovation, world security, human rights and civil liberties hurtling headlong toward one another, with any graduate who will be 18 eligible to vote in one of the strangest election cycles the U.S. has ever endured.
High school and college classes of 2015 emerged just as the Iowa Caucus cycle was starting to heat up, and student debt, international affairs and gun violence became major summer issues. We’re running out of ways to sugar-coat the rough world that faces each graduating class and 2015 seemed to be one of the years where that level of truth had become painfully obvious.
It’s easy to draw comparisons between generations and say one group had it tougher or easier. Iowa’s 1966 high school graduates might have known a greater prosperity in some ways, especially in terms of industrial and skilled-trade opportunities, but the Class of 2016 doesn’t have a military draft for an unpopular war and college deferments among its fears. Fifty years has grown and eliminated many obstacles and advantages.
I remember bicentennial celebrations in 1976 and all the strange “76” labeling of souvenir coffee mugs and the like, and wondering what it would be like to have been the exact age to have a letterman’s jacket with a 76 on the shoulder. Sadly, the Internet era led to so many over-marketed anniversaries and historical celebrations, it gets tougher and tougher to make a big deal out of any one round-number remembrance or reunion.
Speaking of anniversaries, the class of 1986 finished school amid a flurry of some of my favorite pop culture. I’ll get some resistance from fun-thief types who bemoan the 1980s, but even the harshest critic could find a likeable film from an incredible 16-week span when “Short Circuit,” “Top Gun,” “SpaceCamp,” “Cobra,” “Ferris Bueller’s Day Off,” “Back to School,” “Labyrinth,” “Under the Cherry Moon,” “Aliens,” “Big Trouble in Little China,” “Stand By Me” and “The Fly” were released.
The class of 1996 had some unique elements, but I feel the 1990s cannot be acknowledged as a real cultural decade because it was ruined by grunge music (the worst, lowest form of sound) and really lousy gangster rap. It hasn’t really been long enough to gauge the class of 2006’s events in historical perspective.
In the weeks ahead, the high school and college classes of 2016 will be praised and challenged in speeches from classmates, faculty and guest speakers. However, it’s unlikely any of those speakers will say your class is the “most” or “least” of anything; it isn’t necessary. Each class holds a spectacular and unique place, finishing school as a unit and heading on their way at a specific point in history.
Just as my high school graduating class — 1990 — holds no claim on being the best or worst in any category, there won’t be a need for 2016 to top any lists. We all already have a place in history that no one can take from us.
Contact Jason W. Brooks
at jbrooks@newtondailynews.com