Donations from Ken West students, staff save graduation plans
Blitzer video to Ken West grads a lesson in perseverance
The video of Wolf Blitzer’s address to Kenmore West’s Class of 2009 arrived at Kelly Ball’s doorstep in a FedEx box.
Her persistence had paid off — even if she still couldn’t believe it.
But it would take a special effort by the school’s faculty and staff to get the video shown at graduation.
Kelly, 17, got the idea in mid- March of inviting the CNN newsman and Kenmore West grad to speak at graduation. Her calls and e-mails generated a return call two days later by Meryll Conant, Blitzer’s personal secretary, promising to get back to her. She did, in mid- May.
Blitzer would not be able to attend, Conant said, but could send a video to address the students in his absence.
Two weeks later, there it was, outside her door.
“Oh my gosh, it was so cool!” Kelly said.
The teen took it to school to show Principal Karen Geelan, who in turn showed it last week at the seniors’ graduation rehearsal to an enthusiastic response.
Geelan also screened it at the faculty meeting in the school auditorium, where about 100 teachers, aides and support staff gathered. Before doing so, she said an unforeseen problem had arisen:
Kleinhans was charging $1,800 for use of its projection equipment and a stagehand.
That was a lot of unbudgeted money to find to show a two-minute-54-second video.
One teacher suggested posting the video on the school’s Web site as a substitute for showing it at graduation, but that idea was quickly nixed.
“A lot of our kids don’t have computers,” said Diana Gruninger, who teaches English and theater.
The faculty and staff then watched the video, featuring Blitzer’s fond reminiscences of Kenmore West, and his call for students to persevere.
Blitzer’s appearance and words resonated: When the lights came up, the mood was electric.
“Everybody was crying and laughing,” Gruninger said.
“You could hear people say, ‘We have to show this. Parents have to see this. Kids have to see this.’ The emotion in the room just took over,” Geelan said.
Teacher’s aide Eleanor Crispin asked if she could take up a collection. A box was quickly passed around, and it started filling with money.
“People were shouting, ‘I’ve got $10,’ ‘I’ve got $20,’ ‘Do you take checks?’ It still makes me choked up to feel a part of it,” Gruninger said.
The teachers, aides and support staff dug deep into their pockets. In 15 minutes, they raised $1,400.
The senior class adviser then stood up and said the class fund had money left over to cover the rest.
However, more money, it turned out, was still needed.
A larger screen than Kleinhans owned would have to be rented for the video to be shown in the main auditorium. That raised the price tag another $700, to $2,500.
But that also was not insurmountable.
Faculty and staff came up with the additional money, combined with funds from school clubs and organizations.
The video was shown at graduation last Sunday, and Blitzer’s closing remarks, when he repeated the school’s refrain, ‘West is best, and East is least,’ referring to Kenmore East, sent “a thunderous roar throughout all of Kleinhans,” Geelan said.
That was Kelly’s favorite part.
“We say that now and joke about it, and Wolf Blitzer, who has talked to Barack Obama, still remembers. That was the most inspirational part of the video,” she said.
The Town of Tonawanda teen, who plans to attend Brockport State College in the fall with a double major in theater and public relations, is grateful to the teachers for funding the video showing.
Principal Geelan is grateful to Kelly — who she called an “incredible young lady” — for also making it possible.
Geelan, too, feels a debt to the faculty and staff.
“It was the last lesson of the year that teachers taught our students — the lesson of giving and generosity, in telling their students how much they care.”
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