North Judson Seniors, Staff Prepare For Graduation Ceremonies

North Judson-San Pierre Superintendent Lynn Johnson

Seniors from the North Judson-San Pierre High School participated in their final events for their high school careers this week. Superintendent Lynn Johnson said a banquet was held Wednesday night for the students.

“We had our Senior Night and we did recognize many of our Senior students with scholarships from different community organizations,” said Johnson. “We did honor our Valedictorian, who is John Eckert, and the Salutatorian Christopher Lippelt. Both boys have done a wonderful job in their school careers academically, athletically, and in community service.”

A staff breakfast has also been scheduled for today at 8 a.m., something that Johnson says is done every year.

“We do that every year as a culminating activity for our staff members. We have a very nice breakfast served by our food service staff and then we honor our retirees,” said Johnson.

The school is only losing one employee this year to retirement: Betty Klecka, an assistant at the elementary school. Johnson said that they also honor those who have been with the corporation for many years.

“We honor those with many years of experience – we go five, ten, fifteen years and so on. We do have one of our teachers who has 45 years of service, and that is Tom Watts. He is a science teacher at the high school.”

Graduation is set for Sunday, June 3 at 2 p.m. CT at the high school gymnasium. The choir and band will perform at the ceremony, and Johnson says she is looking forward to hearing their alumni guest speaker.

“One of the things with our graduation is we always try to get an alumni back so kids understand that when you leave North Judson and you become a success, you come back and share those experiences you have within our school community,” said Johnson.

This year’s guest speaker is 1990 North Judson-San Pierre High School graduate Keith Stayrook. Stayrook now works for Eli Lilly and Company of Indianapolis as a senior research scientist.