COLUMBIA, S.C. — Many local high schools graduated today all in their own unique ways due to COVID19.
One Dreher High School senior was not able to be at her graduation this morning because she is currently a patient at Prisma Health.
Alfreda Dawkins or 'Fefe' received her high school diploma today but not like the rest of her classmates.
Fefe’s principals and teachers as well as nurses and family gathered in the Prisma Baptist parking garage to give her the recognition she deserves, diploma and all.
“She was on the honor roll from the time she went in school to the time she stepped out of school. Her final grades were all A’s and one B,” Fefe’s mom Lavasha Johnson says. She wasn’t sure if she’d make it to this day.
On May 21 Alfreda was admitted to the ICU because her blood sugar was so high, it put her into a coma.
“Me nor any of my coworkers thought that she would actually make it through," ICU nurse Melissa Sydnor told News19. She says the night she became responsive again, she cried because her comeback was “bordering on the line of miraculous. Something that we don’t see very often.”
Fefe is on the road to recovery but because of the COVID19 outbreak, she has not had visitors. So seeing her family and friends today and getting her diploma was emotional for the graduate. Her mom, stepdad, two brothers, boyfriend and his mother were all there cheering her on.
“She can have her own memorable moment from this. I’m just so thankful that the nurses pullex this together for her," Lavasha says, "Like I told her, you know you didn’t walk the stage with your class members- but you did it.”
Fefe has plans to attend Midlands Tech to become a nurse, something her current nurses are very excited about.
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