To be fair, it was a little anti-climatic.

King’s Fork High School Guidance Director Charlene Jerlin had just announced that Graduate Kenneth Byrd had received a more than $3,000 scholarship from the Walter Cecil Rawls Jr. Educational Trus.

Jerlin welcomed Byrd onstage to receive his scholarship.

Byrd walked up the small flight of stairs, was handed an envelope and waited for a moment to see what to do next.

With no clear indication of what that was, Byrd took matters into his own hands.

With a slight shrug of his shoulders, he calmly walked across the rest of the stage -bypassing King’s Fork Principal Suzanne Moore and Superintendent Milton Liverman – to the applause and roaring laughter from his graduating class.

It set the tone for the rest of King’s Fork graduation ceremony.

When Salutatorian Dannielle Brown spoke to her fellow graduates, she casually mentioned the fact that her class would be the one remembered alongside the 2009 Boys Basketball State Champions.

Students, parents and even faculty erupted with applause and cheers.

During her speech, Valedictorian Sherrie Csuhta told her classmates that she had prepared her graduation remarks just as they all prepared for class each day.

“This speech was written in typical King’s Fork fashion – at 2:30 this morning,” Csuhta said.

She went on to thank all of the students’ parents, families and friends for all of their support and encouragement. Without them, Csuhta said, many graduates would still be asleep in their beds “blissfully unaware we overslept on our graduation day.”

Csuhta also thanked the school’s educators, the “teachers whom we have tortured and have tortured us.”

And to close her speech, Cshuta decided on an inspirational quote.

When Liverman gave his remarks to the King’s Fork graduating class, he quoted President Barack Obama.

In her speech, Brown quoted Englishman Henry Ellis.

Csuhta quoted Dr. Seuss.

“You have brains in your head. You have feet in your shoes. You can steer yourself in any direction you choose.”