Graduation. Time for family, friends, parties and trips.

The typical high school graduation party will not cut it for these maturing seniors as they walk down the aisle May 5 and 6 to receive their degrees and move up in the world.

Ashley Sciore, graduating with a Bachelor of Science, fits into this category.

“We are switching it up from my high school graduation and we are having more of an adult cocktail party. It’s going to be more sophisticated and classy with my closest friends and family,” she said “It goes along with the whole theme of maturing through the past four years.”

However, other people may opt for a more laid back environment to signal their transformation into adulthood.

To avoid long waits at restaurants and bars, Emily Murphy chose to celebrate in a different way.

“We are having a cook-out with family at my house because all of the restaurants will be packed full, and then I’m leaving for a wedding shortly after,” she said.

Renting out bars for graduation parties can also be a very popular way to celebrate. Not all bars will rent out a space for these seniors to use, but the ones that do may sometimes run into problems with double-booking.

Mike Hanhold, the person in charge of renting out Junction for birthday and graduation parties, said they ran into that exact problem last year.

“This year we only have one graduation party planed, because last year we had the problem with double and triple booking,” he said.

Also, this year Hanhold pointed out that it will be more open to the public because the upstairs could be rented out from 8 p.m. to 11 p.m. and only 10 people would be upstairs. In that case, Junction would allow the people downstairs who aren’t guests at the party to go up to the rented space.

Ziggy’s, another popular bar among college students, also has a space for outgoing seniors to rent out. Bob Everhart, owner, said that they have a specific room -the deck area- for seniors to use for private parties.

The date and time can be set by the customers to fit around their schedule, instead of having set hours, Everhart pointed out.

Graduating seniors may also have trips planned to take some time off before they have to either start their jobs or start looking for one.

“I am going to Panama City Beach, Florida the day after my graduation party to see my brother graduate from the Army,” Murphy said.

Trips out of the country is also a choice seniors have as a way to celebrate their own going out into the world. However, for one senior, his trip came early.

“I already went to Ireland with the rugby team last summer as an early graduation present from my parents,” Allen Allred said.

Spending time with the family is also a choice among many seniors, especially the ones who have jobs that are far away from their home town.

“I am going to spend the summer in Columbus to visit with my family, then in September I’m moving to Chicago to begin working full time as a designer,” Sciore said.

While seniors may be plagued with senior-itis and feelings of wanting to break free of the college lifestyles, there will still be some feelings of remorse. After all, they are leaving behind four or more years of memories.

“I’m very excited to graduate, but of course it is sad to leave my friends and crazy nights at the bars,” Sciore said.

While the feeling of moving on into the real world can be overwhelming and a little scary, it is time to move on and have bigger and better experiences.

“It’s going to be rough and sad leaving things I grew to love such as Brathaus and good friends, but it’s time to move on and not be broke,” Allred said.