Jimmy Fallon Surprises Parkland Seniors At Graduation Ceremony

Jimmy Fallon brought some levity and laughter to a somber graduation ceremony on Sunday honoring the 2018 class of Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School.

In a surprise speech, Fallon addressed 748 seniors, along with their families and friends during the commencement that honored four classmates who died in the Feb. 14 school shooting in Parkland, Florida. The school gave posthumous diplomas to Nicholas Dworet, Joaquin Oliver, Meadow Pollack and Carmen Schentrup. The degrees were accepted by family members.

In total, 17 students and educators were killed in the massacre. 

Fallon previously joined survivors of the shooting at the March for Our Lives , the gun control rally in March that Stoneman Douglas students organized in Washington and around the country following the attack.

At the graduation ceremony, he referred to the time he spent meeting some of the students at the rally, and he thanked the whole class for their courage and bravery. 

“You are not just the future you are the present,” he said. “Keep changing the world. Keep making us proud.”

His speech also included some lighter moments he joked to big laughs that the graduates would no longer be classmates, but instead “adults who Facebook search each other at 2 in the morning for the next 10 years.” 

“The Tonight Show” host also gave students some words of encouragement. 

“Choose to move forward,” he said. “Don’t let anything stop you.”