Kansas school’s seniors owe debts before graduation. This woman is trying to help
A McPherson bookstore owner is trying to raise roughly $11,000 to pay off the school debt for 41 seniors, ensuring they are able to get tickets for their graduation and a printed copy of their diploma.
Katelyn Cortez, owner of Twice Told Tales, had originally raised $200, thanks in part to a match from another business, to pay down school lunch debt. She decided to use it for senior debt after finding out from the school district the effect debt can have on graduating students.
The debt can be from school lunches and other things like missing or damaged textbooks.
Seniors with debt are still allowed to walk at graduation and get digital transcripts for college. But they do not get a printed diploma and may miss out on the full allotment of their graduation tickets.
“It just didn’t sit right with me that we had that much debt on our seniors,” she said. “So I wanted to see what I could do about it.”
She made a Facebook post on April 5 about trying to raise money. It is needed by May 12 to ensure McPherson High School students don’t face any issues, she wrote.
She said checks made out to the McPherson School District with “Negative Balance for 2025 Seniors“ in the memo line can be dropped off at the book store, 104 South Main. She will take the checks weekly to the district office. Money from any $1 books at the store will also go to paying down the debt.
A customer brought in $1,000 first thing Tuesday morning, she said. That should bring the balance down to around $10,800.
“We’re grateful to our community partners for stepping forward to support students,” superintendent Shiloh Vincent said in an email. “Our priority is to support students while also encouraging shared responsibility. We remain committed to working with families to resolve any outstanding balances in a way that is fair, flexible, and focused on student success.”
Some of those 41 students have small balances and others have larger “amounts due to multiple years of unpaid lunch charges or missing materials,” Vincent said.
He said that withholding the printed diploma and tickets is long-standing practice at the district.
“It is worth noting that this is a common practice across Kansas high schools,” he said. “To my knowledge, every school has something similar in place.”
He added that in recent years, all seniors have received their full allotment of tickets. That number has ranged from 4 to 8 per senior based on the number of graduates and the seating capacity of the venue.
Wichita Public Schools did not immediately reply to say what they do.
Talks have started about trying to establish a plan to pay off debts for future seniors. One possibility that has been mentioned is setting up a fund with the McPherson County Community Foundation.