FROM THE NEWSROOM:Celebrating success

On Thursday, several hundred Newport-Mesa high school students will be tossing their caps into the air to celebrate the first of what should be many major educational milestones in their lives.

And then, they get to go to grad night.

Now back in my day, grad night wasn’t exactly a memory for the ages. We spent the entire night at Disneyland, from midnight until dawn, with thousands of kids from high schools across Southern California.

Not that Disneyland isn’t special and all — just ask my wife and kids.

But let’s just say that staying up all night long so you can ride the teacups, well, that wasn’t an idea of a rocking time to a lot of 18-year-olds. Granted, Disneyland’s grad night has improved since then, but it also may lack the personal interaction that a party closer to home can offer.

Thanks to people like Lisa Boler and Anne Wong, the students at Newport Harbor High are going to have a much better memory of their graduation night and accompanying festivities.

I got an e-mail last week from Jan Carsten, a Newport Harbor High mom, who wanted to make sure that Boler and Wong, the co-chairs of grad night, got the proper credit for all they have done for the school and community over the years.

“Both these women have been extremely involved and have each given thousands of volunteer hours at every imaginable school event with a need for volunteers or chairmanship,” said Carsten, who like Boler and Wong is also a volunteer and also is seeing her last child finish high school this year.

It’s an enormous job. And so far, out of the 480 seniors at Newport Harbor High School, about 375 have signed up to attend.

For those who don’t know, grad night takes place on Thursday at 8 p.m. and runs through 4 a.m. the next day.

In other words, the kids graduate at 4 p.m. Thursday and come back to the campus to reminisce about all those years of homework and tests and weird substitute teachers and see those friends one more time.

“Grad night is about having a safe, sane, sober, alcohol and drug-free celebration,” Boler said. “We just want the graduates to have one last party time with the kids they went to school with, probably for 13 years. It’s just their class. No guests. It really is a party to celebrate their success.”

Boler and Wong and Carsten are longtime PTA volunteers. Boler, who has four children, has held a number of PTA offices, including president, at Mariners Elementary, Ensign Intermediate and now Newport Harbor High. And that doesn’t count the AYSO volunteer work.

Wong, the mother of three, has been a PTA president at Newport Heights Elementary and Ensign and also is a volunteer for the Newport-Mesa Assistance League.

Wong and Boler have put together a Western Roundup theme this year that takes up both the boys’ and girls’ gym at Harbor High as well as the adjoining courtyard.

Inside the event will be a multitude of activities, casino games, dancing, a hypnotist, face-painting, fake tattoos and, of course, food — lots of food.

“What’s nice about grad night is the whole thing is done by the parents,” Boler said. “We raise the money and build grad night. ... We make sure that everyone who wants to attend can.”

Then, because the kids don’t want mom and dad hanging around with them, the parents of the seniors go home, and the event is then run by the parents of the undergrad students.

Boler, who like me went to Disneyland for grad night, said because this is 24th year that it has been on campus, there is a lot of experience at putting on a quality program.

Sure sounds like that to me.

For those interested in a preview of the Western Roundup, there’s an open house for community members Thursday between 2 and 6 p.m.