Eleven students were awarded diplomas Wednesday morning at Mount Tom Academy’s commencement ceremonies. Mount Tom Academy is a program of the Collaborative for Educational Services (CES), and is located on the Holyoke Community College (HCC) campus. The ceremony was held in the HCC auditorium with a reception for graduates and their guests afterwards in the Kitteridge Center.
CES Executive Director Todd Gazda, sharing a quote from Emerson, told the students that “what is inside you is more powerful than any external circumstances,” and that their potential was “limitless”. Student speaker Trinity Rackliffe spoke movingly of the health struggles that brought her to Mount Tom, and the community she found there which gave her the opportunity to complete her school work on time as well as participate in her sending school band, and dual-enrollment at HCC.
Mount Tom Director and Lead Teacher Lynan Cerruti and teachers Matthew Ifill, Emily Shuster, Justin Leaphart and Max Fripp spoke of each student’s gifts before diplomas were handed out. Graduating students came from eight different schools within Franklin, Hampshire and Hampden Counties.
Mount Tom Academy is a student centered, individualized pathway to high school graduation and beyond, matched to each student’s own learning style, in a small classroom setting. To learn more, please visit the CES website.
