‘Gym already at max capacity’

Jonathan Aguon

The Marianas High School Class of 2023 held its graduation on Tuesday at their gymnasium after a few years of it being out of commission—but with 358 graduates, it was the largest graduating class in MHS principal Jonathan Aguon’s tenure, so the gymnasium was already at max capacity by the time the ceremony started.

A crowd of parents, family members, and friends were left outside unable to get into the gymnasium and were held at bay by MHS staff, with backup police officers called for assistance to keep order as the ceremony was taking place. One person at the event said that parents were upset and were wanting to be let in.

In an interview yesterday morning, Aguon said the gymnasium was already at maximum capacity—they had 900 chairs and had one bleacher on each side that held about 300 people for both—and could not allow more people to stand and overflow and block the exits.

The ceremony was also livestreamed via Facebook and those who could not fit inside the gymnasium were directed to the nearby cafeteria—which had a capacity of 400 people—to watch the ceremony live on a screen.

“I would like to apologize for those who felt frustrated from it and they weren’t able to be there in person. But I hope that they do find the time to recognize and celebrate that their child or loved one was able to graduate,” he said.

“We did do our best to maximize the physical capacity of the gym, while keeping it safe. I do know from my own experiences that, in other events that are overly crowded, it’s not safe, people are just packed like sardines. So we wanted to make sure that we maximize the seating space in the gym and, in order to be able to comply with safety procedures if we do need to respond to an emergency, there’s a safe way to have egress from the venue.”

On why the ceremony was held at the gymnasium and not outdoors like in past years, he said it was due to the time crunch from the recent storm and because the school was used as a shelter. He also said there were disadvantages to an outdoor ceremony, with not being able to recognize or point out the graduates right away as they are under tents.

Aguon also cited the time crunch when asked why they didn’t issue tickets for the graduation. “There was no time to do a ticketing system because on Friday, we spent the whole day preparing the school—we still had flooding from the typhoon, we had to clean because we our cafeteria was used as a shelter. So, within the capacity of my team here, we had to first prioritize the recovery of the campus, the closing and sanitizing of the shelter, and then also prepare for graduation.”

“If we had to do a ticketing system, we would have had to work on the printing, which would have taken time and then have a way for parents to come in and pick up tickets over Memorial Day weekend. Even if we did it that way, people still wouldn’t have gotten tickets and people would have still been upset that they did not get tickets. So, that’s why we decided that the best thing to do given the time was to make it a first-come, first-serve basis.”

As for the graduation ceremony itself, Aguon said he feels very grateful that they were able to have it. “Given that we postponed the ceremony because of the typhoon—everybody was preparing in anticipation of a disaster again—so, we’re very lucky that we weren’t really impacted like what happened on Rota and Guam. Guam’s graduations are postponed indefinitely because of the recovery efforts of the island.

“…That puts things into perspective that we were able to do this for the students—the main people that we serve, that they’re able to get a memorable ceremony. The energy in there was electric, so I think that they understand, and they get to go on to their next adventure in life.”