FORT WORTH, Texas — The West 7th Street Bridge and tower at Arlington Heights High School will light up Thursday night, setting the backdrop for a city-wide shout-out to graduating high school seniors.
Mayor Betsy Price and Fort Worth ISD superintendent Dr. Kent Scribner encouraged residents to join in from their cars or front yards at exactly 8:20 p.m.
“Help us clap and cheer since these kids don’t get a regular graduation and they didn’t get prom,” Price said. “Let’s make them feel loved here in Fort Worth.
It’s been a hard road for this year’s graduating high school seniors.
“The kids who are in 2020 were born into a terrorist attack with 9/11 and they're ending it with a pandemic,” said Tori Canales, 18, a graduating senior at Arlington Heights High school.
The art student will leave the school with a class ring, etched with pencils and paint brushes, but without a normal prom or commencement ceremony.
“It felt like everything got taken away from us,” Canales said. “I really wish we could’ve just finished school inside an actual school.”
Thursday’s city-wide salute might not be the ending Canales wanted, but it’s a sendoff she and her classmates deserve.
“I think it’s really sweet that they’re doing it for the seniors,” Canales said.
Despite the challenges, she doesn’t see this time in her life as an ending at all.
“Even though our senior year was taken away from us, we still have a lot of good memories to make,” Canales said.
The time 8:20 was chosen because it reads 20:20 in military time, an homage to the 2020 senior class.
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