While nearly all of the college-bound graduates of Warren East High School will pursue higher education in Kentucky, Connie Webster of Bowling Green is headed to a university just blocks from the beach.

Webster, 18, was among the 161 students who graduated from Warren East on Saturday in an afternoon commencement ceremony at E.A. Diddle Arena.

In the past five years, two to five students at East have gone out of state for college, according to the Kentucky Department of Education. About half the graduating class goes to school in the state, with the rest moving on to work.

Webster opted to leave the Bluegrass State for the Sunshine State, where she will study meteorology at Florida Gulf Coast University.

&#8220There’s hurricanes and all kinds of weather down there, so why not?” Webster said.

She became interested in weather through her participation in Warren East’s Air Force Junior ROTC unit, in which she was a commander.

&#8220Being in Air Force ROTC, that was one of the main subjects, the weather,” Webster said.

Webster’s mother and sister won’t be missing her when she makes the move to Florida, because they are going with her.

The mother, Gina Webster, is a quality-control manager at RC Components, and got a transfer to the company’s plant in Panama City, Fla.

The three will live together in a house a block from the Gulf of Mexico, Connie Webster said.

Her sister, Kirsten, is ready for life on the water.

&#8220She’s probably more excited than me,” Webster said. &#8220She’s already bought a ton of stuff for the beach.”

Kirsten came into the hall where the students waited before graduation to hug and kiss Webster, who graduated with honors and a $1,000 scholarship for college.

Families and friends filled about half the seats in the lower level of the arena, while the graduates sat in blue robes with gold hoods in folding chairs on the basketball court.

Chain Witty and Mark Duncan were among the crowd. They were there to see their daughter Cimeyon Witty graduate. She will attend Western Kentucky University in the fall.

&#8220She stayed focused and made it on through,” Duncan said.

East’s two valedictorians, Lindsey Lightfoot and Kim Simpson, spoke to the graduates after diplomas were awarded.

Lightfoot quoted a popular song by Natasha Bedingfield and used the lines to build her speech: &#8220Live your life with arms wide open/ Today is where your book begins/ The rest is still unwritten.”

Lightfoot took that idea and told students to consider their lives carefully as they went forward.

&#8220Today, you are handed a new book, and you hold the pen,” she said. &#8220Be careful what you write, because it can’t be erased.”

Simpson crafted her speech around the Robert Frost poem &#8220The Road Not Taken,” which is about a person who comes to a fork in the road and must choose an easy path or a hard path.

The poem ends, &#8220I took the one less traveled by/ And that has made all the difference.”

The graduates should follow their dreams, even if it means taking a harder path or not doing what others think they should do, Simpson said.

&#8220Find your passion and pursue it, to resist the molding of a monotonous society,” she said.

After offering the opening prayer, salutatorian Valerie Wink quoted a proverb that reminded students to be most concerned with self-improvement:

&#8220There is no nobility in being superior to your fellow man. The true nobility is about being superior to your previous self.”