Maria Vasquez Reyes was one of a kind.
The Richland High School senior loved spending time with her siblings, dancing, singing and making everyone laugh.
“She was the life of the party and could light up any room with her beautiful smile,” her family recounts.
That’s why her death in November struck at the heart of her community. She was on her way home with friends when the car she was riding in flipped on Highway 240, killing her in the crash. The 18-year-old driver was charged in her death.
Three months later, her family is asking the school board to award her diploma, letting Reyes posthumously graduate so they can celebrate an important milestone that can be cherished for years.
“It would help me complete this last memory of her, and I would really appreciate it if you guys do,” said her father, Gabriel Moreno, at a recent Richland School Board meeting. “Not just calling her name in some room — I want to call it everywhere and bring closure to the last goal that she wanted to do and finish her Bomber years.”
It’s not the first time the Richland School District has been petitioned by the loved ones of students who have died before they graduated.
Two years ago, a Hanford High School father lobbied the district to allow the names of dead classmates to be read out loud during the graduation ceremony as part of a “spoken recognition” of his son, who died by suicide his junior year.
And in 2018, classmates decorated the empty graduation chair of a Hanford student who drowned just days before he was due to walk with classmates. His name also was called out at the ceremony.
The Richland School Board is considering adopting a graduation ceremony policy that guides schools through the process of responsibly and safely acknowledge the lives of students who’ve died.
The issue is up for discussion at its meeting Tuesday, March 12. It would be the first of its kind in the Tri-Cities.
Most school districts in Washington state do not have a set policy on the books because of the nuanced nature of death and grief. Many also fear traumatizing or harming classmates during an event normally seen as a celebratory.
Some school districts have long-held, often unwritten policies on not acknowledging the deaths of students during graduation ceremonies. Others have opted in recent years to make graduation remembrances with the support of the community.
At a minimum, the board agrees Reyes’ name will be read at the Class of 2024 Richland High commencement and she will be included in the program.
“There is not a right answer to this,” said board Vice President Jill Oldson.
Last month, the board agreed it needed some uniform guidance on remembrances that provides schools a little flexibility to commemorate how they see fit. Family requests have ranged from a chair with the student’s photo at the ceremony to the reading of the student’s name or to the awarding of a diploma posthumously.
While graduation remembrances can be used to help families grieve, they also have the potential to harm students, some professionals believe.
“I think that we’ve heard a lot of people say that there isn’t a right answer, but I think that doing nothing is definitely the wrong answer. Not doing any recognition of students who have passed is definitely a wrong answer,” said board member Bonnie Mitchell.
Remembrance feedback
Richland School District staff asked for feedback from five organizations that offer social services on how they should approach graduation remembrances.
The organizations — which included Tri-Cities Chaplaincy, Lutheran Community Services Northwest, the Youth Suicide Prevention Coalition, Forefront Suicide Prevention, and Underwood and Associates Lifelines — agreed that the district should promote safety and not linger on the topic of death.
- “The district should follow a path that offers the least aversive approach to grief and loss possible. Community care is available for family grief and loss recovery, and does not necessarily need to happen in a large group event such as graduation,” one unidentified organization was quoted in materials supplied to the board.
- “A student attending graduation, who lost a parent during their high school career, might experience the empty chair as a reminder of their parent who is not there to celebrate with them. A student who is close to the deceased or a witness to their death might experience the chair as a reminder of that tragedy and might be in crisis thinking the entire ceremony, unable to regulate their emotions,” said another source.
- They “really like having a graduation program that includes the names of students that would have been members of the high school’s graduating class, with family approval. This allows acknowledgment of the loss but makes it clear that providing more details can have negative affects,” another source said.
Since the COVID pandemic, student mental health has become an acute concern of administrators, teachers and students in Richland schools.
Deaths by suicide are of particular concern and pose challenges for districts to strike the proper balance for honoring a student.
About 1-in-5 seniors across Washington state have seriously considered suicide within the past 12 months, the state Healthy Youth Survey finds. Statistics are similar for Richland and other Tri-Cities school districts.
Suicide remains the second-leading cause of death in the U.S. for people age 10-14 and 25-34, according to the most recent data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Unintentional injuries are the leading cause of death for all people ages 1-44.
Here are some places to turn for help and advice on suicide and grief:
- National Suicide Prevention Lifeline at 800-273-TALK or 800-273-8255 for English and 888-628-9454 for Spanish.
- Crisis Text Line: text “START” to 741-741.
- Trevor Project for LGBTQ youth: 866-488-7386, or text “START” to 678-678.
