A better time of year in Palm Beach County than right now? Not for our high school grads.

High school graduations! The most wonderful time of the year.

We have a soft spot for high school graduations. The Palm Beach Post staff puts up with my seemingly non-stop raving around this time every year.

They are a true source of community pride. Watching those wide-eyed youngsters go across a stage to receive their diploma is symbolic for both the students' first step into adulthood and parents' acknowledgement of a job (hopefully) well done. There are tears of joy from friends and family who had a hand in bringing this young person along through good times and bad, and tears of sadness from the graduates who realize that some of the best times of their young lives are coming to a close.

For The Post , as a newspaper that has had the opportunity to report and write about a handful of these new grads at some point — in triumph or tragedy — marking this occasion is important. Despite so many other things going on in our busy and growing county, we're there to capture in photos and video, the graduation ceremonies of 25 of our public high school classes .

And this year, we threw in one of our private schools, Cardinal Newman High School in West Palm Beach. For the record, The Post requested to shoot the graduations of other Palm Beach County private high school graduation events but were rebuffed. Even by Oxbridge Academy, which graduated 18-year-old Barron Trump , youngest son of former President Donald Trump.

It's tough, but as you, our readers, oft remind, it's worth it. The looks on the graduates' faces just never seems to get old. Our photographers — Greg Lovett , Damon Higgins , Thomas Cordy and Meghan McCarthy — rotate spending the entirety of their day, from 6 a.m. to 6 p.m., at the South Florida Fairgrounds shooting one colorful ceremony after another. Post Visuals Editor Bill Ingram will be working until midnight most days to make sure that galleries and video are perfect.

The result has been the beautiful photo galleries that we have been publishing in the newspaper, and posting on our website, PalmBeachPost.com , Twitter and Facebook accounts, and in our community newsletters .

We know it can seem like small potatoes compared to some of the bigger, meatier news the Post has to cover on a daily basis. But for these students and their loved ones, and even the community surrounding their high school, this moment is just as important as any breaking news or investigative story. At least, today it is.

March on, Palm Beach County grads!... We're all so very proud of you.

Check out some additional stories and photos below from Post staffers from the past week.

As always, I hope you continue to support local journalism by telling a friend about us. We won't mind.

Rick Christie

Executive Editor

You can always reach out to me at rchristie@pbpost.com and find me on X (formerly Twitter) at @rchristiepbp . Or send in a news tip to breakingnews@pbpost.com . Subscribe to independent reporting that supports democracy via subscribe.palmbeachpost.com .

This article originally appeared on Palm Beach Post: A better time of year in Palm Beach County than right now? Not for our high school grads.