South Dakota Honorary High School Diploma for Wartime Veterans

Section 33A-2-34 lets any honorably discharged veteran as defined in 33A-2-1 request and receive an honorary high school diploma if the veteran served in the armed forces during December 7, 1941 to September 2, 1945, June 25, 1950 to July 31, 1953, or February 28, 1961 to May 7, 1975. Two features distinguish it from the equivalents in other states. The veteran chooses the school district, rather than being sent to the district they left, and the section then says the chosen district "shall award" the diploma. There is no discretion in the district and no requirement that the veteran ever attended school there. And nothing in the section asks the veteran to have left school in order to serve, which is the usual condition elsewhere; the periods do the work. The dates are not the same as the wartime veteran periods in 33A-2-2 and the difference is deliberate. This section uses September 2, 1945 rather than December 31, 1946 for the Second World War, cuts Korea at July 31, 1953 rather than running through to 1975, and then opens a separate window from February 28, 1961, which is four months earlier than the Kennedy-era date most Vietnam provisions use and which leaves a gap between August 1953 and February 1961 where no window is open. A veteran who served only in that gap does not qualify, however long the service was. The original 2000 act covered only the Second World War; Korea and Vietnam were added in 2002 and 2005. Section 13-1-66.1, added in 2025, is the modern counterpart at the other end of a career: a student enrolled in a school district who has enlisted in the South Dakota National Guard or a branch of the armed forces may wear a sash, stole or other military decoration at a graduation ceremony, if it was issued by the Guard or that branch for the purpose.