# What did you get for your high school graduation? **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [May 29, 2003, 12:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-did-you-get-for-your-high-school-graduation/178143 "2003-05-29T00:24:30Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Banger](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/8491ac/32.png) [@Banger](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Banger)\ **Post date:** [May 29, 2003, 6:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-did-you-get-for-your-high-school-graduation/178143/21 "2003-05-29T06:47:36Z")
A free ride through college courtesy of the parental unit. I got through law school with a scholarship and federal loans. ---
**Author:** ![Second\_Star\_to\_the\_Right](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/3bc359/32.png) [@Second\_Star\_to\_the\_Right](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Second_Star_to_the_Right)\ **Post date:** [May 29, 2003, 7:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-did-you-get-for-your-high-school-graduation/178143/22 "2003-05-29T07:30:13Z")
About $200 in cash from assorted relatives, and a weekend in NYC. (I’d never been and was dying to go). I made out pretty well. Of course, I was envious of all the people spending the summer after graduation in Europe, but I take what I can get. 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![lawoot](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/35a633/32.png) [@lawoot](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/lawoot)\ **Post date:** [May 29, 2003, 7:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-did-you-get-for-your-high-school-graduation/178143/23 "2003-05-29T07:41:06Z")
Lets see - a CD player and about ten CD’s (college graduation) ---
**Author:** ![The\_Tooth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/c67d28/32.png) [@The\_Tooth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Tooth)\ **Post date:** [May 29, 2003, 7:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-did-you-get-for-your-high-school-graduation/178143/24 "2003-05-29T07:48:48Z")
I got to listen to my mother tell me the night before I’d make a lousy engineer. Thanks, mom! ---
**Author:** ![bibliophage](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bibliophage/32/7615_2.png) [@bibliophage](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bibliophage)\ **Post date:** [May 29, 2003, 10:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-did-you-get-for-your-high-school-graduation/178143/25 "2003-05-29T10:09:25Z")
I got the only thing I wanted: freedom from high school. I think I got $100 cash money too, but that wasn’t nearly as important as freedom from high school. ---
**Author:** ![FisherQueen](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/58f4c7/32.png) [@FisherQueen](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/FisherQueen)\ **Post date:** [May 29, 2003, 10:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-did-you-get-for-your-high-school-graduation/178143/26 "2003-05-29T10:33:07Z")
I got a typewriter. An ELECTRIC typewriter! Used it all through college, too. Who wants to schlep to the computer lab when pulling an all-night writing session? ---
**Author:** ![Mariemarie](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/58f4c7/32.png) [@Mariemarie](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mariemarie)\ **Post date:** [May 29, 2003, 11:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-did-you-get-for-your-high-school-graduation/178143/27 "2003-05-29T11:56:05Z")
Cross pen and pencil set. ---
**Author:** ![Lsura](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/7993a0/32.png) [@Lsura](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lsura)\ **Post date:** [May 29, 2003, 12:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-did-you-get-for-your-high-school-graduation/178143/28 "2003-05-29T12:25:58Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by voguevixen \* > \*\*(My mom told me she hated her graduation present: Luggage, because she felt her parents were telling her: “GO AWAY!”) \*\* I got luggage for my HS graduation - but then, I was going 1200 miles away for college and didn’t have any. And I still have it. I don’t remember what else I got (yeah, the diploma and tassel with a '91 tag on it) - I was the third among the kids in my family and about the 10th grandkid to graduate, so it wasn’t a big deal at all. ---
**Author:** ![FairyChatMom](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/fairychatmom/32/21906_2.png) [@FairyChatMom](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/FairyChatMom)\ **Post date:** [May 29, 2003, 12:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-did-you-get-for-your-high-school-graduation/178143/29 "2003-05-29T12:38:43Z")
I think the family went out to dinner after my graduation. Or was that after 8th grade? I can’t remember. It wasn’t that big a deal. ---
**Author:** ![Queen\_Tonya](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/q/4491bb/32.png) [@Queen\_Tonya](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Queen_Tonya)\ **Post date:** [May 29, 2003, 12:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-did-you-get-for-your-high-school-graduation/178143/30 "2003-05-29T12:40:19Z")
The obligatory family party with the few friends nice enough to endure a non-beer event and lots of cards with cash. I wish I could remember now what I spent all that money on. The oddest present was a coin bank that looked like a miniature wooden keg, filled with dimes. The party was so boring my friends and I dumped it out to count it, there was almost a hundred bucks in there. My 'rents would have laughed themselves silly if I’d requested a car, two?! ---
**Author:** ![fizzestothetop](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/e79b87/32.png) [@fizzestothetop](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/fizzestothetop)\ **Post date:** [May 29, 2003, 12:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-did-you-get-for-your-high-school-graduation/178143/31 "2003-05-29T12:42:37Z")
I got I think about three or four hundred dollars from assorted family members and my parents paid for a trip to Portland, OR so I could spend a week there with my sister. It wasn’t a summer in Europe but I had a great time and I plan on going back this summer (paying for it myself thankyouverymuch). ---
**Author:** ![Michael\_Ellis](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/977dab/32.png) [@Michael\_Ellis](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Michael_Ellis)\ **Post date:** [May 29, 2003, 12:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-did-you-get-for-your-high-school-graduation/178143/32 "2003-05-29T12:42:48Z")
I got the hell out of high school, which was gift enough for me. ---
**Author:** ![calm\_kiwi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/9fc348/32.png) [@calm\_kiwi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/calm_kiwi)\ **Post date:** [May 29, 2003, 12:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-did-you-get-for-your-high-school-graduation/178143/33 "2003-05-29T12:55:37Z")
Freedom to leave the country. Mmmmmmmm them were the days 17 and a one way ticket to Aus! (but i paid for the ticket myself!). Oh I miss the big O.E! ---
**Author:** ![Mercury](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/e95f7d/32.png) [@Mercury](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mercury)\ **Post date:** [May 29, 2003, 1:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-did-you-get-for-your-high-school-graduation/178143/34 "2003-05-29T13:04:58Z")
A bracelet, which I lost in college. I didn’t go to graduation, and I wasn’t planning on going to college. I think my parents got me a present mostly because they felt sorry for me - the circumstances (academic) of my senior year were frustrating, to say the least. Graduation night, however, was mine and Mr Mercury’s anniversary, an he bought me diamond earrings. -M ---
**Author:** ![Kalhoun](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/3bc359/32.png) [@Kalhoun](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kalhoun)\ **Post date:** [May 29, 2003, 1:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-did-you-get-for-your-high-school-graduation/178143/35 "2003-05-29T13:07:26Z")
I got a round trip plane ticket to Florida, where I stayed with my girlfriend’s brother. Inexpensive and fun! ---
**Author:** ![lovelyluka](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/f475e1/32.png) [@lovelyluka](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/lovelyluka)\ **Post date:** [May 29, 2003, 1:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-did-you-get-for-your-high-school-graduation/178143/36 "2003-05-29T13:14:07Z")
What, do the people who received your invitation not give you people gifts? If you count those gifts, I got probably $500 in cash along with some unbelievable items for the hope chest - crystal candlesticks, silver platter, things like that. No kidding. My dad had given me the car he was driving when I turned 16, so a car wasn’t a question. Mom gave me a silver necklace and bought me a mini-fridge for my dorm. Grandparents gave me a check to buy a computer when I told them that’s how I was going to spend my money. Oh, and along with my tassel, the school gave me this gigantic gold medallion with a big “V” on it for being valedictorian. I had to wear it throughout the ceremony. It’s blinging, let me tell you. More spoiled than most, I guess. But certainly not $50,000 worth of cars. My mother has a saying about people like that - “They’re just so happy that they actually graduated.” ---
**Author:** ![SnoopyFan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/d07c76/32.png) [@SnoopyFan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SnoopyFan)\ **Post date:** [May 29, 2003, 1:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-did-you-get-for-your-high-school-graduation/178143/37 "2003-05-29T13:14:47Z")
Let me think … Money. I can’t remember how much. Giving a kid a car for high school graduation is ridiculous, IMHO, although if I’m financially able to I’d like to buy LittleSnoopy a new car when she graduates from college. ---
**Author:** ![Gorgon\_Heap](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/f475e1/32.png) [@Gorgon\_Heap](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gorgon_Heap)\ **Post date:** [May 29, 2003, 1:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-did-you-get-for-your-high-school-graduation/178143/38 "2003-05-29T13:51:01Z")
Well, I know I got some small amount of cash from family members, but not a whole lot. What really got me was my mom and stepdad surprised the hell outta me by getting me a VCR. I expected nothing at all. Still, it made sense as I had a TV for a couple years and they refused to run a cable line to my room. At least I had something new to play my videos on. (I had been using a VHS camcorder I bought during my first summer job.) ---
**Author:** ![Glory](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/7cd45c/32.png) [@Glory](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Glory)\ **Post date:** [May 29, 2003, 2:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-did-you-get-for-your-high-school-graduation/178143/39 "2003-05-29T14:02:27Z")
I got a 500.00 check from my Dad and a small, black and white TV from my mom. ---
**Author:** ![Olentzero](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/90ced4/32.png) [@Olentzero](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Olentzero)\ **Post date:** [May 29, 2003, 2:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-did-you-get-for-your-high-school-graduation/178143/40 "2003-05-29T14:06:29Z")
My great-grandfather’s pocket watch given to him as a wedding present in 1895. It’s still at Mamma O’s house but it’s mine, all mine. 🙂 [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-did-you-get-for-your-high-school-graduation/178143.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-did-you-get-for-your-high-school-graduation/178143.md?page=3)