Graduation

2009 Product Features

• Hallmark offers more than 500 graduation card designs, including cards for:
  • Professions (nurse, law, medical doctor, pharmacist, veterinarian, dentist).
  • Post-graduate degrees (doctorate, master’s and MBA).
  • High school and college graduations.
  • Pre-school, kindergarten, grade school, middle school and junior high graduations.
  • Teachers, coaches, grad-to-grad and parents of the graduate.
• The cards range from serious, complimentary, success-oriented and inspirational to humorous. High school and college cards tend to focus on accomplishments and good wishes for the future.
• Hallmark offers approximately 70 money-holder graduation cards. The majority are designed to also be used as gift-card holders.
• Hallmark Gold Crown® stores offer the widest variety of unique and innovative cards.
• Hallmark (PRODUCT) RED™ graduation cards help save lives in Africa.
• Cards With Sound play audio clips from movies and TV shows, such as "The Simpsons" as well as favorite songs such as “Pomp and Circumstance,” “You Ain't Seen Nothin' Yet” by Bachman Turner Overdrive and “My Wish” by Rascal Flatts.
• Recordable Cards enable the card sender to record a 10-second message that plays when the card is opened. Some of these cards also play music following the recorded message.
• Big Time Sound cards are 11-by11-inches and feature enhanced sound quality.
• Mahogany offers 30 cards for African-American graduates, including money-/gift-card holders, new sorority and graternity cards, and one card for graduates of historically black colleges and universities.
• Hallmark Sinceramente offers 40 Spanish-language graduation cards for Hispanic consumers. The line includes money-holder cards, which also are compatible with gift cards.
• Hoops&yoyo™ are featured for the first time on graduation products offering their humorous advice. A plush figure of the twosome delivers a commencement address, and a pair of fuzzy dice that also serves as a money presenter includes a humorous message for the graduate. The dice are offered at a special price. Other plush items include a specially-priced autograph dog that comes with a permanent ink pen for friends and party guests to sign, Snoopy as Joe Cool complete with a 2009 t-shirt and sunglasses, and a stuffed bear money presenter. 
• Tassel keepers, commemorative photo frames and Instant Scrapbooks are useful and lasting gifts for high-school and college graduations.  A pop-up display board with space for photos and autographs is available at a special price.
• The line also features many other items dated 2009, including ceramic mugs, frames, a water bottle, travel mug with sound feature, key chain and a paper weight.
• Gift Books from Hallmark make perfect gifts for the graduate or for a special teacher who made a difference. Titles include College Survival Guide, Life 101 – How to Ace It, Congratulations Graduate, and Teachers Touch Lives. Here's to You! is dated 2009 and features a place to store the graduation tassel.
• Hallmark offers 2009 graduation invitations, stickers, gift wrap and gift bags, as well as graduation party supplies. The gift wrap collection includes unique ways to wrap up gifts of money or gift cards including a mortarboard-shaped box that plays “Celebration” by Kool & the Gang when you lift the lid and an owl gift box that speaks when the mortarboard cap is lifted. Gift bags and wrap feature trendy designs using popular school colors and showcase the “Class of 2009.” Designs are appropriate for high school and college graduations.

Celebration History

Today’s graduation ceremony is the modern equivalent of the ancient rite of passage from youth into adulthood celebrated in many tribes and clans. Commencement is the contemporary way to acknowledge that an important milestone has been passed.

Early degree ceremonies took place in the mid-12th century at the University of Bologna, and soon after, at Paris, Oxford and Cambridge. Harvard was the first American college to hold a commencement ceremony in 1642.

Graduation gowns reflect the general manner of dress in the late Middle Ages and Renaissance period. Many are black, although the gowns used in many high school ceremonies reflect school colors. The sleeves of a collegiate graduation gown indicate the level of a graduate’s degree.

The four-sided graduation cap first appeared in the 16th century in Scotland. It originally was known as a “trencher” cap because it looked like an inverted serving board – a trencher – with a bowl on it. The term “mortarboard” developed in the 19th century.

High-school graduates in the United States began wearing the now traditional commencement cap and gown in 1908.

In Stores

Available at Hallmark Gold Crown® stores nationwide and wherever Hallmark products are sold. Use the store locator on Hallmark.com to find the nearest Hallmark Gold Crown store.