A controversial graduation tradition at a Waukegan high school was captured in a cell phone video, leaving many viewers confused.
While some students typically are known to throw their caps in the air to celebrate the end of a chapter, in a more recent fad, students are seen throwing folding chairs.
One of the graduates, Megan Howard, says she graduated on Friday night but her evening did not go as planned.
The student captured chairs flying around her in a video, when a chair struck her in the head.
“The metal part of the chair…it was painful,” Howard recalled.
She said she briefly fell to the ground and suffered a mild concussion and the end of her graduation ceremony became a blur.
“It was really hard not to cry because it hurt so bad,” she said.
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Students told NBC 5 that throwing chairs has become a tradition—one that school officials warned against at graduation rehearsal.
The school district released a statement saying in part that “the district does not condone the practice of chair throwing at graduation... this is the first year we have received formal reports of students being struck by a thrown chair, and we are looking into the matter.”
“I put a lot of effort into high school and for my special day to be ruined…it hurt,” she said.
Howard said she has had a headache since graduation but is going to be alright.
Without getting anyone in trouble, she said she just hopes the tradition ends before someone gets seriously hurt.
