PHOENIX — A little over three months since two Valley teens were found shot at a campsite near Mount Ord, their friends want to memorialize them in their senior year traditions.
As of Tuesday afternoon, the Maricopa County Sheriff’s Office said they do not have any more updates on the investigation into the suspicious deaths of 18-year-old Pandora Kjolsrud and a 17-year-old Evan Clark over Memorial Day weekend.
Kjolsrud’s friend Alexis Augone said she wants to honor the two in what would have been their senior year at Arcadia High School.
"They don't get to finish off their high school experience,” Augone said. "It has been a few months, but it still hurts just as much to think about them and know that we're going to school in a place where they were so often and they're not there anymore."
She pitched a memorial page in the school’s yearbook, which has a paid portion dedicated to seniors.
“It starts at $350 and upwards of that for an entire page,” Augone said.
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Augone started an online petition with hundreds of signatures after she said she hadn’t been able to convince the high school to sponsor the memorial page for the former students.
"It's hard. You can't make memories anymore. So to have something that's like on paper and be able to look back at it, it's really nice,” Augone said.
The district responded to the petition with a statement:
We are deeply saddened by the loss of two Arcadia High School students over the summer and continue to extend our heartfelt condolences to their families and friends. The District has reviewed the change petition circulating. While the commentary attributed to the Arcadia High School administration in the change petition is inaccurate, the District appreciates the compassion that Arcadia students have shown one another and the ways in which they want to honor their classmates’ memories.
As a district, we want to be thoughtful and respectful of the grieving families while also recognizing the impact of these losses on our school community. We are exploring appropriate ways to honor the students at graduation, including the possibility of an empty chair tribute, and are reviewing how best to approach student memorials moving forward so that we have a clear and thoughtful policy.
