The graduating class at this Florida high school will make you do a double — and triple — take.
Fourteen sets of twins and one set of triplets graduated June 5 from Cooper City High School in Cooper City, Florida, about 40 minutes outside of Miami.
The group comprised about 6% of the 543 graduates.
“It was very special as they would come across the stage; I would shake their hand and give one a diploma, and then the second one would come over to do the same thing,” Vera Perkovic, the school’s principal, tells TODAY.com.
“It kind of just symbolized they’re their own person, but also, they have been together all these years as twins,” she adds.
Cooper City High School Principal Vera Perkovic referenced the twins and triplets in the class during her speech at graduation.Courtesy Broward County Public Schools
Among the graduates are two sets of identical twins and 12 sets of fraternal twins, NBC 6, our South Florida station, reported.
Gabrielle and Jocelyn Reed are one such set of identical twins.
“It was a great moment. It was also just bizarre because you raise twins, and everything is two at once,” Gabrielle and Jocelyn’s father, Aaron Reed, tells TODAY.com. “So, on some levels, it was twice as exciting, but it was also twice as chaotic and overwhelming.”
The sisters have attended school together since pre-K. Come August, they will go their separate ways for college.
Gabrielle is headed to Cornell University, while Jocelyn will attend Washington University in St. Louis, Missouri.
“I’m just really excited to go somewhere separate and be on my own,” Gabrielle says. “Everywhere I go, I’m lumped together with her and not really seen as my own person, so I’m really excited to be able to have my own experiences.”
As the editor of Cooper City High School’s yearbook, Jocelyn was always aware of the number of twins in her class, but it wasn’t until the group was in a room together that she realized just how special it is to have that many multiples.
“When you’re a twin, people treat you as a spectacle,” Jocelyn said. “So, it was crazy to see that it’s so common and that there are so many people that are also twins.”
Cooper City High School’s class of 2024 graduated June 5 at Nova Southeastern University in Fort Lauderdale, Florida.Vera Perkovic / Courtesy Broward County Public Schools
Broward County Public Schools believes the graduates have set a county record as most sets of twins to simultaneously graduate from one school.
Some of the students even created a slogan to commemorate their unique graduating class: “Twice as nice and triple the fun.”
