The eighth grade class celebrated three years of hard work and
the promises of the next stage of education.
The eighth grade class celebrated three years of hard work and the promises of the next stage of education.
“High school, here we come,” said Jonahluis Galvez, South Valley Middle School student body president, to the deafening cheers of her fellow classmates Wednesday evening.
Draped in forest green robes, nearly 200 South Valley eighth graders paraded across the stage at Christmas Hill Park to receive a certificate marking the successful completion of grade school.
A sea of families overflowed from the amphitheater at the park. Parents readied their video cameras for the moment their eighth grader walked across the stage. Younger children ran up and down the ramps waving dripping ice cream treats purchased from one of the many ice cream vendors who parked their carts near the stage.
“I was nervous,” said Malissa Lewis, 14, whose march across the stage prompted a particularly rowdy roar from the audience. Lewis will attend Christopher High School next year and worked hard to make it through a “tough year.”
Her friend and future Christopher High student, Destiny Enciso, 15, said she’ll miss her middle school friends next year, some of whom will go to Gilroy High.
In total, South Valley, Brownell and Ascencion Solorsano middle schools will promote more than 600 students to ninth grade, middle school principals said.
At Solorsano’s Thursday evening promotion ceremony, Principal Sal Tomasello said he planned to emphasize how his students will have more opportunities to participate in clubs, sports and other extracurricular activities next year with two high schools.
“It will be very positive for our community,” he said.
High School Principals James Maxwell and John Perales each took turns at the microphone at South Valley’s promotion assuring students that they would be welcomed with open arms in the fall.
“Gilroy High School has a rich tradition of success of students from South Valley,” Maxwell said.
GHS has sent two students to Stanford University in recent years, both of whom attending South Valley as children, he said.
Karen Perez, 19, clutched a bouquet of mylar balloons for her cousin, Alejandra Pacheco. A graduate of South Valley herself, Perez said still keeps in touch with a couple middle school friends and remembered her own promotion ceremony.
“It’s huge here,” she said of the elaborate ceremony. “Everyone makes it a really big deal.”
