North Augusta High School celebrates ‘Senior Decision Day'
NORTH AUGUSTA, S.C. (WJBF)- High school seniors across the country have made their college choices. Friday, North Augusta High School celebrated its seniors with an event revealing their after graduation plans.
It was Senior Decision Day at North Augusta High School and the whole school cheered on its seniors as they prepare to take their first steps into life after high school.
'It feels really good to know that they care about us that much and they always have. So it really feels good to close out this chapter with something like this,' said senior, Jada Printup.
The crowd cheered as the seniors broke through banners with names of their chosen universities or tech schools.
While those seniors prepare for college, some are directly entering the workforce. Others will serve our country in the military.
Printup told NewsChannel 6 that the decision process was stressful but she's ready for her next steps at a student at Clemson University.
'It's so exciting. It's scary going into the next chapter of life, but I'm really excited about it and it's a good time to grow and find new friends.'
It's Casey Rogers's first year as principal at North Augusta. He said Decision Day isn't just about celebrating seniors.
'But I want it to serve as an inspiration for all underclassmen. So it's not just about our seniors. It's also inspiring our underclassmen as they look to college and prepare for application processes and getting ready for that next step.'
Rogers added that he is incredibly proud of the class of 2025.
'So these students have overcome a lot of challenges. And I think one thing that I've seen develop through COVID and post-COVID is these students have a level of perseverance and focus that I didn't have as a student, and I'm just excited to see that pay off for them,' he explained.
Printup said she's excited about the future but she'll never forget the teachers who supported her journey.
'I'm tearing up a little bit. But some of the teachers here have made like a huge impact on me and on Coach Brennan specifically. He's a really good man,' she said emotionally.
The celebration continued with a senior picnic. More senior events will follow throughout the month as these students prepare to graduate on May 30th.
Copyright 2025 Nexstar Media, Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Yahoo
7 hours ago
- Yahoo
Arkansas stuck among bottom five states for child well-being, report shows
(for Carter's Kids) Arkansas remains among the worst states for child well-being, ranking 45th nationwide for the second year in a row, according to the annual Annie E. Casey Foundation report released Monday. The group's 2025 KIDS COUNT Data Book measures 16 indicators of child well-being in four categories: education, health, economic well-being and family and community. The report ranked Arkansas: 36th in education 45th in economic well-being 46th in family and community 47th in child health Arkansas has consistently ranked in the bottom 10 states overall and in the specific categories. The state's statistics worsened for the majority of indicators in 2023, the year the data in Monday's report was collected. The report drew comparisons between 2023 and 2019, the last year before the COVID-19 pandemic led to widespread socioeconomic impacts on families. In that time, Arkansas saw a decrease of children who live in poverty or whose parents lack secure employment, but the state's rates of children in those situations outpaces the national rates, according to the report. In 2023, 144,000, or 21%, of Arkansas children lived in poverty, only a 1% decrease since 2019. The state also had fewer children in high-poverty areas with 68,000 in 2023, a 2% decrease since 2019. Aecf-2025kidscountdatabook-embargoed Other indicators remained stagnant, such as 37% of children in single-parent households and 12% of high school students not graduating on time, according to the report. The state 'cannot become complacent as the result of modest improvements,' said Keesa Smith-Brantley, executive director of Arkansas Advocates for Children and Families in a press release. AACF is a member of the Casey Foundation's KIDS COUNT network. 'We should be particularly alarmed by the outcomes for our teens,' Smith-Brantley said. 'We're trending in the wrong direction for teens not attending school and not working and teens who are overweight or obese. And while Arkansas's teen birth rate improves each year, we're stuck at or near the bottom because of the policy choices and investments we're not making.' In 2023, 17,000 Arkansas teens were neither working nor attending school, a 3% increase from 2019. Children and teens between the ages of 10 and 17 saw a 4% increase in obesity rates from 2019 to 2023 while the national rate remained stagnant, according to the report. Additionally, Arkansas had almost double the national rate of teen pregnancy in 2022, even after a 17% decrease since 2019. By 2023, the state's rate had dropped from 25 to 24 births per 1,000 females aged 15 to 19, according to the Casey Foundation report. The national rate is 13 births per 1,000 females. 'Those babies are more likely to be born in families with limited educational and economic resources, and if you have a baby as a teen, there are simply going to be more challenges with finishing high school, going on to college and working [up and] out of poverty,' AACF policy director Christin Harper told reporters in a Wednesday news conference about the report. President Donald Trump's administration has attempted to withhold Title X family planning grant funds, which include teen pregnancy prevention efforts. This is one of several recent federal actions that Harper and other AACF leaders said would put child well-being in Arkansas at risk. Nearly 3,400 Arkansas babies were born with low birth weights in 2023, a 0.4% increase since 2019. Being born at less than 5.5 pounds, often caused by premature birth, creates health risks for children not only in infancy but throughout childhood and even into adulthood, according to a 2024 Casey Foundation report that highlighted the racial disparities among children's health, particularly affecting Black Arkansans. 2025-KCDB-profile-embargoed-AR Arkansas also consistently has among the highest rates of maternal and infant mortality nationwide, but it remains the only state that has taken no action to adopt the federal option of extending postpartum Medicaid coverage from 60 days to 12 months after birth, according to KFF. More than half of births in Arkansas are covered by Medicaid, the federal-state health insurance system for low-income Americans. Additionally, Arkansas' rate of child and teen deaths worsened from 2019 to 2023, totaling 300 per 100,000. About half of the more than 800,000 Arkansans on Medicaid are children. An additional 50,000 children in Arkansas, or 7%, were uninsured in 2023, a 1% increase from 2019, according to the KIDS COUNT report. A federal budget bill moving through Congress would make deep cuts to Medicaid spending, reducing the program by $625 billion over 10 years, and shift some of the cost of the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), commonly referred to as food stamps, to state governments. As of March, 235,927 people in Arkansas received SNAP benefits, the Advocate previously reported — approximately 7.6% of the state population. AACF leaders said last week that they are concerned the budget bill will worsen child well-being in Arkansas if it receives approval from Congress and Trump. Arkansas' SNAP program contains a work requirement, and the state has taken steps to impose a work requirement for recipients of the Medicaid expansion program. The federal budget bill would also add new Medicaid work requirements for some able-bodied adults. AACF has repeatedly denounced such requirements. U.S. House GOP mandates Medicaid work requirements in giant bill slashing spending Children who live in households at risk of poverty 'are especially likely to fall off of health care [coverage] because their parents can't meet the work requirements,' said Maricella Garcia, AACF's race equity director. The organization is also concerned about the 43,000 Arkansas children aged 3 and 4 who were not in early childhood education programs between 2019 and 2023, AACF education policy director Nicole Carey said. This number increased 6% between 2015 and 2018, according to the report. Fourth-graders in Arkansas were 3% less proficient in reading in 2024 than in 2019, according to the report, and state officials have made improving childhood literacy a priority in the past few years. The wide-ranging LEARNS Act of 2023 implemented literacy coaches in public schools graded 'D' and 'F' by the Department of Education. Under the new education law, students who don't meet the third-grade reading standard by the 2025-26 school year will not be promoted to 4th grade, but $500 tutoring grants will be available on a first-come, first-served basis with priority to those to be held back in third grade. Carey pointed out that the fourth-graders of the most recent school year were in kindergarten at the start of the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020. 'When they did their testing in the school year of 2023-24, that was when a couple of those literacy pieces [of LEARNS] were still being implemented, so we really can't say yet if the literacy coaches in the 'D' and 'F' schools or those literacy tutoring grants are going to impact this indicator,' Carey said. 'There's definitely hope that they will.' Nationwide in 2024, '70% of fourth graders were not reading proficiently, worsening from 66% in 2019 — essentially undoing a decade of progress,' the report states. SUBSCRIBE: GET THE MORNING HEADLINES DELIVERED TO YOUR INBOX
Yahoo
3 days ago
- Yahoo
Five years later, some COVID-era graduation traditions live on
COLUMBUS, Ohio (WCMH) — High school graduations were among the hundreds of practices adjusted in the wake of COVID-19, and five years later, some still don't look the same. In 2020, many districts turned to virtual ceremonies or heavily restricted in-person events. Five years out, high school seniors are able to enjoy a more classic ceremony. However, some central Ohio school districts continued select COVID-era practices, turning adaptations into new traditions. See previous coverage of 2020 adaptive graduations in the video player above. Grandview Heights Superintendent Andy Culp said in 2020, the district hung banners of the graduating class along a fence on Grandview Avenue. Hayley Head, Grandview Heights' executive assistant to the superintendent, said the tradition has continued since. Initially parent-driven, Head said the banners are hung the weeks around graduation to celebrate seniors. Big Lots reopening fourth wave of revived Ohio stores 'Five years later, this has become one of the many traditions that celebrate our graduating seniors and it is also a much anticipated community tradition as well,' Head said. Bexley City Schools also continues to hang senior banners along Main Street post-COVID, as does Whitehall on Yearling Road. Whitehall Schools Director of Communications Amanda Isenberg said the district prints individual banners for each senior. 'It has become a visible way to celebrate our graduates and their hard work,' Isenberg said. Larger districts were less likely to maintain COVID-era traditions. New Albany-Plain Local Schools spokesperson Patrick Gallaway said district bus drivers delivered yard signs for each graduate in 2020, but with 441 graduates this year alone, it was not cost-effective to continue it. 'The one thing we still do is a slide show that we run on the jumbotron at Huntington Park before the ceremony,' Gallaway said. 'It is definitely a labor of love.' Gallaway said parents have also continued making an Instagram account each year since 2020 to celebrate the graduating class. The account is not associated with the school, but posts photos of graduates and their after-high school plans. Where to find specials Friday for National Donut Day New Albany-Plain is one of many larger districts that did not maintain new traditions, but have leaned into the technological or logistical adjustments from COVID. Hilliard and South-Western City Schools representatives both said commencement is almost entirely back to pre-COVID operations, but both schools now offer video formats for people who cannot attend in person. South-Western makes graduation videos available online after, and Hilliard livestreams the event. Pickerington spokesperson Jacqueline Bryant said the district first implemented a ticketing system for graduation in 2020. The district continues to use ticketing, although students now receive eight tickets each instead of the two they had in 2020. Olentangy spokesperson Amanda Beeman said the district adapted in 2020 and 2021, but has since gone back to its many pre-COVID traditions. She said with multiple high schools, anything else would be tricky. Gahanna-Jefferson, Reynoldsburg, Upper Arlington, Canal Winchester and Westerville also told NBC4 they have fully reverted back to pre-pandemic celebrations. 'We had a parade instead of a graduation ceremony in 2020. We tried doing both a ceremony and a parade in 2021, but it turned out to be too much for families to juggle,' Upper Arlington spokesperson Karen Truett said. 'We've been back to 'normal' for the past several years.' Copyright 2025 Nexstar Media, Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
Yahoo
3 days ago
- Yahoo
Campaign to revive ‘neglected' Grove Park allotments which played role in WWII
A campaign to revive allotments in Grove Park, with community history dating back over 100 years, has been launched with the goal to raise £12,500. Baring Road Allotments in Grove Park were first established in 1913 as a Co-Operative Land Club and managed by the Lee and District Land Club. Spanning over 11 decades, these historic allotments played a key role during WWII as part of the 'Dig for Victory' campaign, providing food to local residents. But over the years these allotments – described as an 'amazing community asset' – have become uncultivated and neglected, with the Covid-19 pandemic playing a major role in their decline. These historic allotments played a key role during WWII as part of the 'Dig for Victory' campaign. (Image: Donna Ford) A campaign, established by the allotment's new committee Wild Rangers, could see the allotments transformed to their former glory. The non-profit organisation, which is dedicated to enhancing underused green spaces, is set to launch its Aviva Crowdfunding Campaign with a £12,500 goal fundraiser, with an Open Day and Plant Sale set to take place this Saturday (June 7) between 12pm and 2pm. Kay, founder of Wild Rangers, said: 'It's disappointing to see the neglect of such an amazing community asset. Growing together has so many benefits for mental wellbeing; helps combat social isolation; improves physical health; and helps to strengthen local communities.' A campaign could see the allotments transformed to their former glory. (Image: Donna Ford) The revitalisation of the allotments are part of a wider community-led imitative to establish The Railway Children Urban National Park to safeguard Grove Park's greenspace, which is believed to have been the inspiration for E. Nesbit's The Railway Children. Work has already commenced to clear the allotments, with work led by staff and volunteers, however the fundraiser is hoped to raise needed funds to help the organisation tackle larger capacity jobs to get the allotments up and running again. The reduction of local allotments has been impacting communities across the UK over the last decade, as research conducted by Sheffield University revealed that allotment land has decreased by over half (65 per cent) by 2016. The revitalisation of the allotments are part of a wider community-led imitative to establish The Railway Children Urban National Park. (Image: Donna Ford) However, these spaces can be vital for local communities in a bid to help tackle food poverty, with Lewisham Council passing the 'Right to Food Borough' motion committing to helping communities in Lewisham have more access to healthy and sustainable food. Kay explained: 'Allotments up and down the country are often under-appreciated. This despite a growing demand and long waiting lists. 'With new fresh community-led energy now getting behind bringing this vital space back to life, we can enable many more people enjoy the benefits as the revived plots can be taken up by new tenants. 'We also hope we can raise enough funds to also deliver a community garden within the allotment.'
