Academic award ceremonies are designed to be events where parents and the school community recognize the academic achievements of PA students.

They are not a time for underclassmen to behave like preschoolers and embarrass the entire school.

Unfortunately, on Tuesday, that was the case at Pembroke Academy’s semester one award ceremony.

The mayhem began with The Pledge of Allegiance, where select students from the sophomore class were hooting, hollering and screaming. The ceremony hadn’t even officially started but the sophomores’ tomfoolery was in full form.

As members of administration continued the ceremony, stopping numerous times to reproach the sophomores, they still didn’t seem to get the hint.

An unspoken rule of school-wide award ceremonies is that no one claps until all the recipients of a category is recognized. When the sophomores were reminded of this, it fell upon deaf ears .

Dean of students Mr. Herbert reminded sophomores three times to stop their “sophomoric” behavior, but still no one complied.

When Mr. Morris, director of curriculum stepped to the podium, the ridiculousness was untenable. “Sophomores, you will be the last class released today because we [the administration] need to have a word with you,” he told them.

After the ceremony when parents had left the building, headmaster Mr. Famulari thanked the freshmen for their exemplary behavior. As students filed back to class, he held the sophomores and expressed his displeasure with the sophomore class.

Proper conduct at any ceremony is learned in elementary school and should be understood by the time students reach high school. It’s fairly simple: sit quietly so students can hear their names being called. It is upsetting to everyone when one student receives a standing ovation and another one doesn’t. That is why administration tells everyone to wait to clap until everyone in the category gets called.

What was even more upsetting was that certain members of the sophomore class still appeared to be impressed with themselves. Sophomores, that behavior was decisively unimpressive. In fact, you embarrassed your class and our school.

Mr. Famulari made it clear that if anyone misbehaves at the next award ceremony, there would be severe consequences. Hopefully, between now and May, these children will grow up.