The #1 Graduation Decoration and Gift Idea for 2020 - Graduation Yard Signs
It’s the year 2020 and everything is anything but normal. COVID-19 has effectively shuddered all public events, sports, office parks and forced us all into new norms. This couldn’t have happened at a worse time for high school and college graduates whose plans of celebration have all been put on hold or permanently cancelled.
Why are Mom’s and Dad’s of Grads crazier this year?
If you're a parent of a 2020 grad it’s not just the world that turned upside down, but what to do for your own graduate may have got you going crazy too. What’s happening during the moment of graduation that’s so significant?
Perhaps it’s simply recognition of the achievement of passing a milestone and that’s all it is? Why then is there so much celebration placed into this one moment in a person’s life? Why are grandma and grandpa so upset right now when they should be proud? Why are Mom and Dad looking over so many photos of their graduates to be and seeming lost? It’s because they are sad that the biggest celebratory moment in their son or daughter's life so far won’t be photographed, decorated, recorded, and celebrated like they had hoped.
In a typical graduation year, recording every moment and seemingly going a little crazy over everything that’s happening in a graduate’s life would be easy. Perhaps it’s got something to do with much more than the individual themselves. In these strange COVID-19 times everything looks so much different because we’ve been forced to change how we operate.
Power of the Pivot
This may be the biggest reason that families across the country are pivoting to buy graduate signs as their way of celebrating the graduates in their lives. Congratulations graduate yard signs have quickly become the #1 graduation decoration of 2020. For parents and grandparents this switch to something new is in some way a means to share the pride they have with their graduate and the community around them.
For the graduates themselves, the devastating news that there would be no more seeing their friends at school in classes quickly cascaded to the cancellation of proms for high schoolers, and spring sports, senior weeks, and finally graduations for high school and college grads alike. What could be more shocking to a high school or college student that has literally had graduation as their singular focus over the years of their life?
2020 high school and college graduation yard signs by ELC Photography
For Emma Lookner of Louisville, Colorado the shock of no graduation ceremony in two weeks seems to resonate as she said everything got cancelled and now we’re here. She was referring to being outside wearing masks and looking at the new graduate sign that Erin Cox of ELC Photography just placed in the Lookner’s front yard. When Emma’s Mom came outside to see the sign she said, “I’m trying really hard not to cry right now. She’s worked really hard. I’m just screaming out to the world that she’s accomplished so much. It was very important to us. She’s going to go out there and conquer the world, we hope.”
ELC Photography feature on 9News.
Shout Outs with Graduation Yard Signs Shatter Shuddering In
For now, this form of shout out is all parents and grandparents can do. They are equally proud of their children who have worked so hard over years to get to this very moment. For each graduate their purpose is the same, complete the work that’s required to move beyond the milestone and reach that next stage in life. That sounds simple enough to anybody that graduated and already has their diploma and all their pictures to document that it happened. However, no single graduate achieves commencement on their own and every graduate will admit to that.
It’s a multi-touch process that began years before and has been building up to this very moment of crescendo. Each person that a graduate has worked with from teacher, to counselor, to administrator, friend, teammate and coach are part of the process. All are in this experience with the graduate with the single purpose of encouraging growth, resilience, tenacity and the achievement of completing the tasks of getting to that next stage in their journey. When the greatest sign of achievement was until recently formally recognized as a hug or a high five, graduate yard signs seems to be the only new safe, touching thing to do to celebrate in the form of grad decorations.
For Kai Martin also of Louisville, he commented “not having a graduation is a shock.”
When asked why she bought a graduate yard sign, Kai’s Mom said “you get creative right and we do something different.” When talking about Kai, she shared, “he has compassion and has a really great heart. He’s super smart, you know I have the smartest kid.”
Graduate yard sign of Kai Martin - Monarch High School
Hearing these stories is heart wrenching for Erin Cox the owner of ELC Photography who has been delivering hundreds of signs to local parents and making shipments to families all over the US. When asked why she does this now instead of what she did before she replied.
“When our business shut down due to COVID my mind went to the graduates that I typically photographed for families. I thought that making graduate signs with existing family photos was one way to give those families a chance to share the love they have for their graduating children. The parents out there are super proud of their kids and are just beaming with pride. They are looking at finding all the creative ways possible to share that feeling. We’re honored that we can be that source of inspiration and means to celebration for them.”
Erin Cox owner of ELC Photography delivering graduation yard signs
Indeed it’s completion of such an event as graduation that often brings tears of happiness that overshadow the tough times when things just don’t quite work out as expected. However, it isn’t the times of discouragement that are remembered during graduation ceremonies. It’s literally the massive coming together of a community to celebrate the tears of joy and happiness. For the family, friends, teachers, administrators and community members, graduation is indeed a time to celebrate. In a time when the events surrounding graduation senior weeks, dances yearbook signings are all on hold due to public health mandates surrounding COVID-19 the meaning of graduation is no less important.
These graduate signs are indeed an indication of the incessant value of prideful parents, grandparents and communities. It’s no doubt that graduate signs might be here to stay as just one more way of celebrating the right of passage that we took for granted as something that would never ever stop.
For all 2020 graduates and families we thank you for your pride and creativity. Sometimes, it’s the little things that we do to go big like having a large lawn sign that shouts out, “we couldn’t be prouder of our 2020 graduates.”
Proud grandma Jacki, poses by graduation yard sign for her recent graduate.
Maybe, just maybe, that graduate sign will end up in a living room or den one day for either Emma or Kai and be remembered as a time when all else in the world stopped for a while,
“The pride and celebration that my parents and grandparents had for me as their graduate just couldn’t be bottled up and kept inside.”
When asked about the making the pivot of her business, Erin Cox remarked, “after having done professional photography for years, I never thought I’d feel the calling of making yard signs. However, each time I deliver one and hear the story of a graduate, tears fill my eyes.”
There’s just no stopping it. Graduate yard signs are now a thing in America. Call them graduate keepsakes, 1-page yearbook signs, graduate memorabilia, or graduate pride signs; one thing’s for certain, American Mom’s and Dad’s haven’t forgotten the importance of going big when the going’s stuck at home.
Want a yard sign to celebrate your high school or college graduate?