Cultural College Graduations - Inclusive or Exclusive ? (episode 7)
Being in one arena, one group together, as well as I've been familiar with, and I just graduated with my doctorate degree about, I don't know, I guess it's going on seven years ago or six years ago, and we were all together in an arena. So even then I didn't know about cultural graduations or saw any announcements from my college about that
Anybody who's involved in the ceremony or graduation ceremony itself is already on salary, so they're not paying them anymore or any less for being there or not being there, right? If it's a cultural celebration, what is involved or what's being asked of the organization that the college to spend in order for this to happen, really, it's negligible, right?
I just know at the last college graduation I was, I would imagine there was quite a bit of expense laid out with respect to food, a band, tons of people in the arena, as well as photographer that they've chosen to pay for that day, to take tons and tons of pictures. So I'm sure the expenses there, but also the planning, the tremendous planning and coordination that it takes to put the graduation together. Think about that
And I think you made some great points with respect to expenses, but I will say again, to play devil's advocate in return, a lot of those things are very specific to how a graduation ceremony is done the american way, right? But how many other cultural ways of celebrating graduation are going to be done with a big band and a photographer and ticket prices and everything else, right?
And again, if you want to have these cultural celebrations, by all means, please do so. But I feel that in my particular case, and speaking just from my own perspective, I feel that it dilutes the special qualities of a graduation itself and it splinters off into different categories. And I think we should be more inclusive of the entire student body and those who have the distinction of graduating, whether it's just a regular graduation, whether it's for honors or any other special achievements
But for instance, I totally get it and understand where you're coming from and your perspective, your argument, your stance is that, hey, we've all been on the same boat together and worked hard towards the same objective, which is getting a degree. And once we're done and we're finished with all our classes, it culminates into a beautiful graduation ceremony that we should all participate and partake in as a team, as an inclusive team
