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Doreetha Daniels Gets College Degree at Age 99

Nebraska native fulfills lifelong dream, breaks record for oldest graduate.

Here's a story that will either inspire you or leave you feeling incredibly lazy. Doreetha Daniels fulfilled her lifelong dream of completing her college degree last week...at 99 years young.

After making a pledge in 2009 that she would graduate before she turned 100 years old, Daniels finally walked in her commencement ceremony at College of the Canyons in Santa Clarita, California on Friday (June 5). She also set the record for being the oldest person to graduate from the 45-year-old institution.

| HIP HOP'S PROUD PAPAS OF THE 2015 GRADUATING CLASS |

“I accomplished what I wanted to do, and this is my dream come true,” she told KTLA after the ceremony.

Daniels, who was born in Nebraska and lived through Prohibition, Jim Crow, the Suffrage Movement, Vietnam and so much more, has arguably seen more with her own eyes than she could ever learn from a textbook, but, according to her, nothing compares to seeing your name printed on a diploma. “Don’t give up. Do it. Don’t let anybody discourage you," she says to her decades-younger classmates. "Say that, ‘I’m going to do it,’ and do it for yourself.”

Congrats to Daniels for this huge accomplishment, and for being an inspiration to us all. 

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(Photo: CBS 2, Los Angeles Local News)

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