FORT WORTH, Texas — Texas Woman’s University graduates didn’t walk the stage in their Denton auditorium this week like they would most years. Instead, they ended their college years with a victory lap around a NASCAR track as their families cheered them on from their vehicles.  

With the pandemic still causing problems across the world and large, close-contact events still being discouraged by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, leaders at TWU decided to go with a big, drive-through graduation at the Texas Motor Speedway in Fort Worth.

Instead of having a seat in the bleachers to watch, families went along with their graduates for the ride. 

A long line of cars stretched from outside the track into the infield tunnel where, inside, each carload got to take a lap around the historic track. At the end, each graduate got to get out of her or his car, cross the finish line in cap and gown and receive a diploma as the usual dignitaries looked on. 

Nursing student Sydia Cole said it wasn’t the way she pictured her commencement ceremony looking when she first entered college, but then again, she didn’t know what it would look like when she first entered this odd school year. It was a year filled with virtual classes and mandatory masks. 

“Honestly, I was praying like, hopefully we get something,” said Cole as she waited with her family for her turn to walk across the TMS stage.

The ceremony was certainly different as students tuned into Chancellor Carine Feyten’s speech via radio and watched their fellow students walk via the Big Hoss screen overlooking the track. However, different isn’t always a bad thing as families decorated their vehicles with well wishes for their grads, whooped and hollered as they took their victory lap around the track, and Cole and her fellow grads crossed the finish lines with smiles ear to ear.

Feyten said all things considered, it was a great graduation for the school.

“It’s the symbolic nature of the graduation, right? So, we don’t have all the speeches, but I think this is what the students really want; they want to be here, experience it with their families,” Feyten said. 

A lot of Texas universities and schools are trying similar ideas to make the Class of 2021’s final hurrah something special, despite the circumstances. Others tried drive-through events as well, while some, including Texas Christian University, went for a more traditional ceremony, albeit spaced out and with masks and COVID-19 precautions in place, but pomp and circumstance none the less in a strange year.

Any ceremonies are certainly a welcome sight by most graduates after the Class of 2020 had to, largely, graduate in virtual ceremonies or very scaled-back affairs. 

Some universities, such as TCU, even welcomed members of last year’s class to come out for this spring’s commencement and experience the ceremony they missed out on last year.