By Luke Johnson

Over 600 graduates filed in for Deer Valley High School’s commencement ceremony for the Class of 2015, on Thursday, June 5, in what was the most attended event in school history, according to Principal Ken Gardner.

“This is the fullest we’ve ever seen the stadium,” Gardner said during his graduation speech. ”The culture of the school is changing and evolving into become accepted by the community to be a college- and career-going culture, and that’s what we’ve been striving for.”

Despite constant negative news about student behavior, valedictorian Hannah Howard feels the school is misrepresented and that viewers outside looking in only the trouble makers.

“There are a lot of misconceptions about this school,” Howard said. “Whenever my family or anybody says, ‘Hey, there’s a lot of stuff happening at your school,’ I always say, ‘Well, you aren’t looking at the 99 percent of the other people who all get along.’ They are just paying attention to the one-percenters who are the bad apples.”

Gardner added that the negative news happened off campus, and that suspension and disciplinary rates have dropped while attendance has improved (well over 95 percent) in the past four years.

“The school, for some reason, has always had a bad reputation and we’ve been struggling for years to overcome that, and I think this class proved in,” Gardner said. “Community members were taking small things and making them much bigger than they needed to be.”

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DVHS graduates flie in photo by Lori Cardera

DVHS Principal Ken Gardner

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