High school graduations get underway next week. It's a five day marathon of 15,000 students at the Thomas and Mack Center and the Orleans Arena. Budgets are tight and some people wonder if the district should be spending big bucks on graduations.
Each year, the Clark County School District pays about $500,000 for 42 graduations at the two venues.
Abby Spruce is like a lot of high school seniors -- a little camera shy but bursting with ideas. "I want to go to a fashion design school in California," she said.
Abby wants to work on runways, crafting fashion. Soon, she'll be on a different runway -- graduation. "I'm excited for her. I think it's an accomplishment. She's an honor graduate," said Abby's mom Lisa Spruce.
Lisa knows that graduations are a little different here in Las Vegas. "I think I would like to see something a little smaller, something a little more personal," she said.
CCSD uses the cavernous Thomas and Mack Center and the Orleans Arena as graduation sites. But it comes at a price -- $500,000 a year which adds up to almost $12,000 for each graduation.
Sandy Ginger works with contracts for CCSD. She says both venues give a reduced non-profit rate of $70,000 for both all week. She says the other $430,000 come from union jobs like lighting techs, sound operators, camera ops and other facility personnel. That's on top of school police for crowd control and parking.
Why not just hold it at school? "Most of them don't have a stage that's the right size. They don't have a sound system that would work. They'd have to be on the football field," said Ginger.
But a few hours roasting in the hot June sun would not work, and because of space, only two people per family could get tickets. "One of the reasons we're at big venues is that we want the important people in that student's life get to come," said Ginger.
A special day costs money and Abby Spruce's artistic adventure is getting underway in an arena. Her class at Palo Verde has about 600 students graduating. That's just one school.
But $500,000 spread out among 15,000 graduates means CCSD is only spending $33 a student. A small price made big by the fifth largest district in the country.
