Under sunny skies at one of Southern California's premier racing venues, Santa Anita Park, 854 Arcadia High School students are set to walk across the stage and get their diplomas.
It's a scene playing out in similar arenas across the country right now. But not many can boast what the Arcadia class features — a 100 percent graduation rate.
"This is very rare," according to district spokesman Ryan Foran. "Our usual graduation rate is around 99 percent, but we can't remember any time this has happened in recent history."
Arcadia High has a total student population of over 3,600 and serves the entirety of Arcadia Unified School District. It's unheard of for a public school of that size to have an entire class graduate.
The graduates have also received $12.8 million in scholarship money, the school said.
One of the graduates, class valedictorian Stella Cho, has gotten straight As in 101 consecutive classes from the sixth through 12th grades. She also served as the president of two clubs — the pre-med society and the green team, a conservation group.
Her extracurricular activities include playing oboe in the Pasadena Youth Philharmonic Orchestra and volunteering at Arcadia Methodist Hospital. She has also helped conduct biology research at Caltech.
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Cho plans to study biochemistry at the University of Notre Dame in the fall.
She has more pressing concerns on her mind at the moment, though.
"I just hope my speech goes well!" Cho said.
