'Your past does not define your future': Teens graduate while awaiting trial

"Pomp and Circumstance" played. Teachers gave speeches. Kids turned their tassels.

But the small graduation in Mount Auburn was not an ordinary event. These weren’t ordinary graduates.

After the April 5 ceremony, the two teens who received their diplomas could not drive across town to go party with their friends. They weren’t even allowed to leave the venue.

While their peers are looking forward to college or a trade school, these teens are facing possible prison sentences.

'Our job is not to punish them'

This was the third graduation ceremony held at the Hamilton County Youth Detention Center since the beginning of 2023.

While youth at the facility have earned their diplomas in the past, the ceremonies are new. Director Brian Bell said there may have been similar events but not in decades.

“The more we do it, the more we’ll achieve because everyone will want it,” Bell said. ”We’re all in here together. It’s as gratifying for our staff as it is for these kids. Half this staff is here on their off day.”

The state requires the center to provide education to all the youth held there. There are classrooms like you'd find in any other school. In addition to the youth's right to an education, research has shown that education in juvenile facilities lowers recidivism.

The detention center, like other county juvenile lock-ups in Ohio, is only used for pre-trial detention. No one there has been convicted or sentenced, but they have been accused of everything from auto theft to murder. Most of the stays are short, but some youth stay a year or more while their cases work through the court system.

At the facility, the teens take classes and some earn enough credits and pass enough tests to get their diplomas.

Bell, who speaks philosophically about his job and the goals of his facility, said “tangible gratification” is hard to come by behind the locked doors at 2020 Auburn Ave. This ceremony is one of those moments.

Bell emphasized everyone at the center – an average of about 85 kids at any given time – is innocent until proven guilty.

“Our job is not to punish them. It’s to keep them safe,” Bell said. “We do whatever we can to make life a little bit better for them than when they got here. As good or better. Not worse.”

A different kind of milestone

Correctional Officer Whitney Bingham did a Kroger run before heading to work on the day of the graduation. She wanted to pick up some things for the ceremony.

She was scheduled to start work at noon but showed up hours early. She said she was “too excited.”

She greeted the families in the lobby with a huge smile and escorted them to the gymnasium, leading them through a door that had to be unlocked by a guard, downstairs via a secure elevator and through two more locked doors.

In the gym, about two dozen family members and an equal number of staff members sat and stood facing a small podium. Silver, black and gold balloons drifted around the floor.

Simple programs were on every folding chair. Notably absent: the graduates' names. The Enquirer agreed not to name the teens either.

Hamilton County Juvenile Court said both graduates are young men, arrested as teens, facing felony charges in adult court. Both will face trial in front of an adult-court judge and both could be sentenced to time in prisons for adults, not kids.

While this graduation ceremony marks an achievement for these teens, it also means they are closer to going to trial.

'Your past does not define your future'

During the ceremony, the charges the two teens face were never mentioned. If the boys thought about their possible time behind bars, their smiles and poise in their robes didn't show it. Even if those thoughts sneaked in, the crowd of cheering and smiling family members may have been loud enough to drown it out.

The roar of clapping filled the gym as the first graduate walked between the rows of chairs.

He wore a black robe and mortarboard hat with a black and red tassel. These are the colors of his home school, Oak Hills High School.

His principal, J. Travis Hunt, was there to hand over the diploma.

“Your past does not define your future,” Hunt said. “Stay focused on your dreams. May your future be filled with success.”

The teen pulled a yellow piece of paper from under his robe and read the words he'd prepared. He thanked a long list of people including staff members.

“This wouldn’t be possible without my mom, dad, family and God,” he said “I love y’all.”

Gail Ash, a Cincinnati Public Schools teacher assigned to the center, presented the next graduate, welcoming him to the podium with a fist bump.

She called him an “amazing student” who is a lifelong learner and reader.

“These two young men are amazing,” she said, smiling. “Now you may flip your tassels.”

The moms, dads and siblings mobbed their new graduates. It was hug after hug. A young woman took one of them by the hand and twirled him around to get a good look at him in his robe. Everyone got their hugs.

The boys played it cool mostly, but their smiles never faded throughout the ceremony.

'When a student wants help, how do you say no?'

Sister Janet Linz has taught at Purcell Marian for 25 years. Before the ceremony, she had carefully made her way to the gym carrying a small gift bag.

She usually comes to the detention center about twice a month to help the students, but to help one of that day’s graduates, she stepped it up to twice a week.

She said he needed help with English and was very unsure of himself. She worked on the fundamentals but also on his insecurity.

She smiled, remembering when she overheard the boy talking to his friends about the upcoming ACT test. He told them, "I just need to be confident." Her words had sunk in.

Linz said she had always wanted to volunteer at the center, but it wasn’t until last year that she did it. She said it’s taught her a lot.

“To see the expression on the kids’ faces,” she said. “When a student wants help, how do you say no?”

Not giving up

From the podium, Judge Kari Bloom told the teens their work and development matters.

“While we might not have met under the best circumstances, I could not be more proud," she said. “We value education here. To do otherwise is to say when you’re charged with a crime, we give up.”

After the ceremony, the teens and their families headed to three folding tables covered in food. Four other teens also held at the detention center served chicken wings, carrots, cupcakes and snacks.

Those teens helped prepare the meal for the celebration, and like the graduates, were preparing for their own futures. The four were part of a program at the center with Aramark, a food service company. Those who complete the program are guaranteed a job with the company.

The younger kids played and squirmed through the crowd. The families moved the chairs into circles in the gym. The graduates sat close, catching up with their parents and other relatives.

But their time was limited.

A staff member told them they could visit with their new graduates in the gym until 2:30 p.m., just two and a half hours after the ceremony began.

This article originally appeared on Cincinnati Enquirer: Hamilton County Youth Detention Center holds its third graduation