By EMILY SPARACINO / Staff Writer

BIRMINGHAM – Nearly 400 Oak Mountain High School students stepped into a new phase of their lives as they walked across the stage at UAB’s Bartow Arena during their graduation ceremony May 20.

Clad in blue caps and gowns, white stoles and honor cords, members of the OMHS Class of 2015 marked the end of their high school careers in the company of numerous family members and friends crowding the arena to see them graduate.

In speeches to their classmates, valedictorians Ian Jenkins and Matthew Tindal recognized the excitement and anticipation the evening signified for the students.

“This is the moment we have all been waiting for,” Jenkins said. “This is a day everyone in this room should be proud of.”

Tindal said he was “equal parts excited and afraid” about starting a new chapter, but would take valuable lessons he learned in school with him and encouraged his classmates to do the same.

“Stand out,” Tindal said. “Think for yourselves, and be who you want to be.”

Senior Class President Corbin Meredith presented the Class of 2015 as candidates for graduation.

The OMHS Singers sang the National Anthem and the OMHS Alma Mater.

Shelby County Board of Education member Jane Hampton brought greetings from the board and congratulated the graduates.

“I look out here and see those cute faces of all those children I had in elementary school, and it makes me so proud,” she said.