Congratulations, graduates!

Our friend tells us she attended the Commencement last week at my old high school, Tallahassee's Leon High School (Commencement pictured above top), where our friend Maria's son Vaughn graduated. Also graduating from high school this week is Devon, Stephanie's former colleague Marilyn's son (who has a college soccer scholarship awaiting him), and (later this month) from Fort Knox's Bluegrass Challenge Academy, a military-style boot camp, is Douglas, a friend and fellow church member who went with us on the Guatemala mission trip last summer (also Emily from church from Louisville's Atherton High School). Graduating from elementary school last Friday were Stephanie's four fifth-grade English as a new language students: Kent, Adrian, Karen, and Thalia. They'll be attending middle school next year. Congratulations to all of you!

Also last week, my nephew Jacob (pictured above below) earned a different kind of academic promotion. He, his teachers, and his parents decided jointly that he should move from first grade this year to third grade, at his Virginia elementary school. Jacob could have started kindergarten a year earlier than he did, since he was narrowly in the right age group (but waited a year). So, now, he will rejoin his agemates. Jacob is a very good reader and good at math, and this move will make it easier for the school to match the level of instruction with his skills, although he'll miss friends in this past year's class and no doubt it will be a little bit of an adjustment). Congratulations, Jacob!