Career and Tech graduates 88 seniors; principal retires

WASILLA — Addressing the 88 graduating seniors of Mat-Su Career and Technical High School Friday, salutatorian Kristina Gergilevich told her classmates about a project she embarked in the summer of her 13th year.

Every night she took a picture of the sunset from atop a hill.

“We are waiting for that sunset today,” she said. “Tonight there will be another sunset. But for us it represents something else.”

She invited her classmates to pick their own metaphor — the first page of a book; a blank canvas — but graduation, she said, is the start of a new stage in life.

Palmer Deputy Mayor Richard Best held back tears thinking about the days when CTHS principal Ben Eveland — coached him as a high school football player in Kenai.

He thanked Eveland’s family, “for sharing him with us for over 32 years.”

For Eveland, the ceremony also marked a transition. He is retiring this year. He was the principal when the school opened four years ago, which means that this class is the first one to have attended the school all four years.

And this is a great class to go out on, he said, enumerating the various competitions in which the students had taken top honors.

“Every single qualifying senior has passed the high school qualifying exam,” Eveland said. “I know that extraordinary qualities lie in each and every one of you.”

As he spoke he held up a wooden plaque etched with a message from a student, Nathon Deel.

As a child, Eveland said, Deel, “was kicked in the head by a horse and he was in a coma for two weeks.”

Deel had to work hard to overcome that traumatic brain injury. Eveland pointed to the story as an example of the adversity students often face.

Like the students, many of whom are heading into the workforce, Eveland saw Friday as a transition to a new phase in his life.

“I hope (it) will still be centered around providing opportunities for young adults,” he said.

Contact Andrew Wellner at andrew.wellner@frontiersman.com or 352-2270.