Editorial: Celebrate, Class of 2021

Dear Class of 2021,

Nothing about your senior year was normal. COVID-19 changed so much of the way the school and world operates, but you did it, and if this last year has taught us anything, it’s that we can overcome anything.

For the last year, it has been a world of adapting to a new normal. COVID-19 changed everything about the celebration of your senior year. You deserved one more Dakota Days celebration, one more football game, one more play, one final farewell. And while you will have a graduation ceremony this May, things still won’t feel the same.

Despite all that COVID-19 has affected, each of you has become a stronger person for it, and no one will be able to take what you are about to do away from you. You are graduating college during a pandemic.

You are the next class of leaders in the community, and the resiliency you showed through a pandemic-riddled senior year to finish strong makes you all the better. 

The pandemic is still here, we are still battling COVID-19 every day, but that is no reason to hang your head. When you receive that paper, walk across that stage, start working your dream job or continue into graduate studies, celebrate. Celebrate everything you went through to get to this point and rejoice that you have made it to where you are today.

The Vermillion and USD community is behind you. You spent your senior year helping ‘Protect the Pack,’ now go out into the world and make that same pack proud. Once a Yote, always a Yote.