Randolph
But Caitlinn Alexander, who graduated from Randolph Union High School on Friday evening, had to learn to fly considerably earlier than many of her peers when a difficult family situation led to her filing for emancipation early on in her senior year.
She was born in Brooksfield, Vt., where she lived with her parents and two siblings.
Her father took his own life when she was 4.
“After that, we did a lot of moving around,” Alexander said. Over the coming years, she would attend school in Tennessee, Montpelier and Middlesex, Vt. This included a stretch of time when she lived with her grandmother, as well as a stint in foster care.
“My mom had a really hard time after my dad died,” she said. “It was difficult for her to take care of us.”
After bouncing around throughout her early childhood, Alexander finally returned to Randolph to live with her family when she was in fifth grade. But then, last summer, her mother was in an accident that left her with significant third-degree burns, requiring her to move to Cape Cod in order to be closer to the hospital where she was receiving treatments.
But Alexander couldn’t bear to uproot her life again. Among other reasons, she’d already started her senior project, on blacksmithing, and had found a real passion for it. She also wanted to study archaeology and anthropology at the University of Vermont, and needed to qualify for in-state scholarships to make her goal a reality.
But most of all, she said, she just wanted to graduate in a place she had ties to; Randolph was where she’d lived the longest, after all.
“I just couldn’t give up another home by leaving Randolph,” she said. “That just wasn’t really an option for me.”
So she stayed, and became officially emancipated in January. Though the process was stressful at times, requiring her to present her case in court and prove that she could support herself financially, it has been more than worth it, she said.
She’s been living with her best friend, Dakota Browder, a rising senior at RUHS.
“Living with Dakota’s family has been really good,” she said. “I feel like a part of their family, which is nice because I haven’t really had a complete family like that in a long time.”
She and her sister Samantha, a 2014 RUHS graduate, are the first people in their family to attend college. And for Alexander, taking that next step “means everything,” she said. “It means I get to complete this chapter of my life, and say goodbye to my childhood and everything that happened, all the trauma of the past, and move on into adulthood.”
Her mother, grandmother and brother — all of whom Alexander hasn’t seen since March — were at the ceremony, cheering her on as she walked across the stage.
“They’re so proud of me, and I know my dad would be proud of me, too,” she said.
Alexander joined 62 of her fellow graduates on Friday evening under the graduation tent, where the rainy weather did not dampen the festive occasion.
Kajinowele Lungu, the first senior speaker, shared a poem by Will Allen Dromgoole called The Bridge Builder, about an old man who constructs a bridge over a “chasm vast and deep and wide” so that future generations may cross it.
Lungu urged his fellow graduates to consider their own “bridges” at RUHS and beyond. Not only should they reflect on “what sort of path they would like to lay down” for those who follow them, he said, but they also should “take a moment to reflect on the bridge builders that came before us,” whether they be parents, teachers or former students.
Jacqulyn Laraway, the next senior speaker, likened her classmates’ experience in the Randolph schools as a ride on a roller coaster.
She joked that the lowest point on the ride for many members of the class was seventh and eighth grade, which were “not the best years in terms of fashion or personal hygiene,” but which gave way to exhilarating ups and downs in the years that followed.
Laraway said that although her classmates would be “going on to different parks, different attractions and different experiences,” she hoped they would always remember the ride they weathered together.
Dave Barnett, co-principal of RUHS, shared a heartfelt, often whimsical poem he’d written about the Class of 2017. The poem incorporated a kind word about each of the 63 students, with lines like: “Who’s heading off to college as a (lacrosse) superstar? Chey Jones, that’s who, and I bet she’ll go far!”
Jamie Connor, an English teacher at RUHS and the keynote speaker at the graduation ceremony, surprised the class by placing colorful woven bracelets under each of their chairs.
She advised them to “wear the bracelets with intention and meaning”: If the graduates ever noticed themselves using their voices to project negativity into the world, Connor instructed them to shift their bracelet from one wrist to the other as an exercise in self-awareness.
“Be mindful of the mark you leave on this earth, and remember your hearts,” she told the Class of 2017, before adding, “Yours are the biggest hearts I’ve encountered yet.”
EmmaJean Holley can be reached at eholley@vnews.com or 603-727-3216.
Randolph Class of 2017
Noah Christian Abbot; Nicholas S. Adams; Caitlinn Emma Alexander; Ashton Bachand; Seth A. Bent; Jonathon M. Blakeney; Addison Blanchard-Rooney; Amanda T. Cass; Michael Churchill; Riley Jacob Corey; Adam Benjamin Craney; Kira Lynn Delhagen; Sean M. Desroberts; Robert Jason Draper; Taylor May Duval; Gabrielle P. Farrington; Tia R. Ferris; Jameson Edward Flaherty; Olivia R. Forcier; Cheyanne A. Garrow; Danielle A. Garrow; Dominique Mae Gonzalez; Galen H. Goodenough; Travis R. Gray; Trent R. Gregoire; Trevor Merton Gregoire; Jacob Glen Huffman; Joshua J. Huntley; Naomi M. Husher; Cameron Jarvis; Gregory Earl Johnson; Cheyanne A. Jones; Erin Mishelle Kondi; Jacob Mathew LaPerle; Jacqulyn R. Laraway; Addiena M. Luke-Currier; Kajinowele Mapalo Lungu; James Grayson Marks; Haley S. Moreau; John W. Ott; Elliot Winter Papp; Nicole Elizabeth Perrin; Chester Philbrick Jr.; Phillip M. Porter; Jordan E. Poulin; Michelle A. Poulin; Amelia F. Rose; Mackenzie Grace Rumrill; McKenzie J. Sabin; Kaitlyn Dolores Sargent; Amber Lynn Silloway; Brooke E. Slocum; Melody A. Slocum; Jarrett Parker Snow; Jenna Mae Sprague; Maegan C. Springer; India Rose Tweedie; Aiyanna J. Vargo; Ethan Romeo Vela; Austin Wheatley; Alicia P.D. Wilder; Chloe D. Wright; Abigail R. Zani.