School system officials have scheduled graduation over two days. Ceremonies begin 2 p.m. Thursday, with West Rowan High School seniors the first to toss their tassels.

Last year, Rowan-Salisbury moved East Rowan and South Rowan ceremonies to Keppel in the wake of school shootings in Littleton, Colo. and threats of violence in local schools.

Those two schools joined Salisbury and North Rowan, which have held their commencements at Keppel for years, and West Rowan, which began coming to Catawba in 1997.

Security will be tight again this year under the watchful eyes of school system officials and the Salisbury Police Department, Rowan-Salisbury spokeswoman Kathy Walters said.

“I don’t think it will be any more overt or obvious, but I think it will be even more effective,” she said. “Just because Columbine didn’t happen this year, that doesn’t mean anybody’s going, ‘Oh well, that’s never going to happen again.’ ”

Although security will be taken no more lightly than last year, officials say holding the ceremonies in the air-conditioned, handicapped-accessible auditorium with padded seating has more to do with comfort than concern.

Keppel seats about 1,400 people — more than school auditoriums — and more can watch the ceremonies on video screens in an adjoining lounge and theater.

Football stadiums, where East, South and West held their graduations before moving to Keppel, seat more guests, but leave them and graduates exposed to bad weather.

Henry Kluttz, West Rowan principal, said a storm on graduation night in 1996 spurred his school to move to Keppel, a place to hold “a more formal, nicer graduation where you didn’t have to fight the elements.”

In two of Dr. Alan King’s seven years as South Rowan principal, storms drove crowds from the stadium during graduation.

The ones that weren’t rained out took on a “football stadium type atmosphere with hollering and chanting and screaming,” he said. “We really feel like a high school graduation should still be a dignified ceremony, and we had that at Keppel.”

The only snag so far this year is parking, and the school system has made plans to address that. Catawba is renovating some parking lots around Keppel, but seniors have gotten information about satellite parking and shuttle buses to the auditorium.

Superintendent Dr. Joe McCann said that graduation went so well last year, he asked the principals if they wanted to use Keppel again this year, and all of them agreed. But that doesn’t mean it’s a new tradition.

“I suspect that issue will be considered by the high school principals and the superintendent each year,” he said. “And the best option that we know available will be the one recommended for use.”