The Effect We Leave Behind: Upper Classmen Traditions
Every school has its traditions. Some are serious, some are strange, and some make absolutely no sense until you are the one participating in them. Colleges have their own rituals for welcoming students into groups or marking major milestones. High schools have their versions too, just with a lot less questionable behavior. At MLEC, upperclassmen traditions give students their own way to celebrate where they are in high school.
Junior J, Junior Social, Junior Rings, Senior jeans, Senior Sunrise, Senior Crown and graduation all mark different points in the upperclassmen years. Some have been around for years, while others change little with each class. They might only take up one day or a few hours, but they become part of the school year students remember.
Junior year is when students first get to participate in traditions they spent years watching older students do. Junior J is one of the biggest examples. Juniors receive a letter “J” to decorate, turning a simple letter into something that represents their own creativity. This year’s Best Junior J winner was Isabella Henriquez.
“It was a way to express myself creatively and make memories that I’ll look back on from high school,” said junior Isabella Henriquez.
For Isabella, the tradition had been familiar long before she was the one participating in it. She had spent previous years watching older students take part, making this year feel like a change in where she stood within the school.
“Honestly, just being part of Junior J made me realize it because it’s something I always saw the older students participate in,” Henriquez said.
Junior J’s is only one piece of junior year. Junior Social gives students time to spend with their classmates outside the regular school routine, while junior rings marks a huge step toward graduation. They may not carry the same level of attention, but they give juniors their own set of moments before senior year arrives.
Senior year brings a whole new set of traditions. Senior jeans turn the Class of 2027 into a walking yearbook page, covered in painting and memories from the people and activities students have spent the years with. Senior Sunrise gives classmates a chance to start the year together before the school day even begins. Then there is Senior Crown, which adds a little competition to the mix.
This year, senior Daniela Guerra was selected as the Senior Crown winner. The tradition also came with some disagreement over the selection process. Senior class officers asked students to submit the crowns through an Instagram post before selecting Guerra as the winner.
Some students questioned why the senior class did not vote on the final selection. The disagreement did not stop the tradition, but it showed that students care about how traditions representing their class are handled.
That is part of the responsibility that comes with being a class officer. Senior class president Tristen Pierre is helping plan a year that keeps familiar traditions while giving the Class of 2027 room to create its own.
“As class president, I feel honored and excited to help create memorable traditions that make every senior feel included and celebrated. I will honor important traditions while adding fresh ideas based on student feedback to make the Class of 2027 unique,” said Tristen.
Planning those events also means considering what students actually want. Not every idea works for everyone, and what sounds fun in a group chat may look very different once an entire class has to participate.
Not every tradition needs to be a huge event, either. Sometimes it is the smaller things that fill in the spaces between the big ones. A junior ring sitting on someone’s finger, painting your jeans together, or a group of friends meeting before sunrise can be part of the story just as easily as the events everyone talks about. Either way, it all eventually becomes something that students will never forget..
That is probably the strange thing about school traditions. While you are doing them, they can feel like another thing you have to show up for. You complain about the early morning, argue about the decorations, and take way too many pictures anyway. Then the year ends, and those same things somehow become the moments you wish you could experience one more time.
“Sometimes you will never know the value of a moment until it becomes a memory.” The quote, often attributed to Dr. Seuss, fits these traditions almost too well. We do not always know when we are living through something worth remembering. Then one day, the school year is over, the traditions belong to the next class, and all we have left are the pictures, the stories and the people who were there; ultimately, that is proof we were here.
