As a huge audience let loose with deafening cheers and whistles, the last students to graduate from Northern High School switched the tassels on their mortarboards from one side to the other, a sign that an era of city school history has come to an end.

Yesterday's 35th commencement at the city's largest and possibly most problematic public high school symbolized the end of Northern as many know it. By the fall, Northern's school number, 402, will be retired and four new ones will be issued for the smaller institutions that will take its place.

Amid the applause yesterday, the weight of past and future difficulties was apparent. Addressing the graduates, school board member J. Tyson Tildon told them they were "miracles," and added, "This society has failed you. Now you as graduates, you have the awesome responsibility of not failing yourself."

The goal of school officials is to create more rigorous and more manageable schools -- an idea many welcomed yesterday, even at the expense of losing Northern's identity. Although some people said they had mixed feelings about the changes, most seemed to think the school would benefit academically from a more intimate environment.

"I think it's for the better," said Travis Brutom, 18, in between hugging his friends goodbye. "You got such large numbers here, it's hard to keep them under control."

Sometimes turf fights erupt between students from different neighborhoods, said another graduate, Jazmon Johnson, 18. "In smaller schools, more people will know each other. The classes will be smaller. That's the way it should be," Johnson said.

Under a plan approved last month by the Baltimore school board, Northern, which has more than 2,000 students, will be split into two schools with separate academies for business and environmental science. In the fall, each will have a new name and between 700 and 800 students.

A new high school will open at the professional development center, an existing school system facility on East Northern Parkway, starting with about 300 ninth- and tenth-graders. And a second high school is slated to open in the fall at a temporary site in central Baltimore, although school officials have not said where.

For now, no one seems sure what will become of Northern's traditions: its green-and-white colors, or its triumphant alma mater (which most students hadn't heard before a practice run Friday). Even its teachers don't know where they will be assigned come September.

Northern has struggled with a high rate of student violence -- caused, students and teachers insisted yesterday, by a small percentage of bad apples. The recent negative reports of the school peaked in November, when a 15-year-old freshman was severely beaten outside the building.

"If the administration of the school gets the support it needs, then Northern will be fine," Paul Keene, a ninth-grade social studies teacher, said of the plan. "Despite all the bad publicity, this is a good school. We feel positive about it," he added.

The school is especially proud of the 2002 graduates, teachers said. The group numbered 320 in the commencement program, the largest class to earn diplomas during the past five years, Principal Betty Donaldson said. Boosting the total were former dropouts whom the school lured back to classes. About 10 percent of the graduates were listed as planning to attend college.

Class salutatorian Rochelle Myles thanked teachers for their dedication and urged her classmates to not to squander their lives: "If we made it through this place, we can do anything."

Outside the auditorium, some graduates' relatives expressed hostility toward the school. Several people traded profanity with school police officers trying to control the crowd and car traffic. A few parents vented about the administration's organizational skills and its failure to keep track of their children.

But Del Holmes, whose son received his diploma yesterday, thinks the school does not deserve exclusive blame for its problems, which he said reflect those of society. Many working parents don't have time to oversee their children's academic progress, for instance, and crowded schools cannot serve as homes-away-from-home, as some schools did when he was a student.

So regarding wistful thoughts about Northern's last days, he said, "I think the nostalgic thing, when it comes to most inner-city schools, is long gone."