Spring Street International School kicked off a quartet of graduation ceremonies at San Juan Island schools in the coming week by honoring the nine members of its graduating class in both familar and inspiring style, Saturday, at the San Juan Community Theatre.

Seated on the theatre’s main stage, as so many others have before them, the nine soon-to-be graduates listened intently as members of the faculty and the school’s administration, and special guests, recounted lasting impressions of each student and their individual journeys since they first arrived at the Friday Harbor school.

The slideshow, with its accompanying soundtrack, was — as always — an amusing and heartwarming hit. And in what’s become a Commencement tradition, the faculty’s Heather June took on the task of bestowing a single adjective that best embodies the personality of each graduate.

Thus, Dasuni Gurushinghe, the lone female among nine graduating seniors, will be remembered as “Joyful”, and Chung Ming Mak as “Mysterious”. Robin Lohrey was given the moniker “Open-hearted”, while John Mason conjures the notion of “Insightful”, and so on.

As a prelude to each adjective, the school’s musical instructor, Grisha Krivchenia, played a brief piano tune intended to capture the essence of each of the graduates’ personality in a melody.

Scholarships were awarded. Words of encouragement were offered by faculty members and the head of the school, Louis O’ Prussack, who advised the graduates, “to take intellectual risks; don’t just settle for mixing and distilling the information we have, but create a new one”, and to not be afraid to say “No”.

“Say ‘Yes’ to what you have to, to advance your dreams, and say ‘No’ to the rest,” O’ Prussack said. Jeff Smith, who will soon return to the school as a math instructor following an academic expedition of his own , extolled the virtues of hope, faith and love, and encouraged the graduates to keep a place for each in their future.

“We need you to lead us,” Smith said. “Because we’re headed into the unknown. Keep connected to love.”

It was Class Valedictorian Dylan Nelson who brought down the house, however, with a tale of an obscure scientific study in which he noted that a group of caterpillars ended up starving to death because they lack an ability to “deviate” from the herd and improvise when the situation demands. With  lessons learned from trips abroad and because of the spirit of adventure and individuality embraced and nourished by Spring Street’s faculty, Nelson said there’s no chance that the Class of 2011 would succumb to such a fate.

“Spring Street students are many things,” he said. “But one thing we are not, are caterpillars.”

T-shirts and bumper stickers can’t be far behind.