VIRGINIA NEWS – 101-year-old African American woman set to graduate college in Virginia

Mariah Cain, Staff Writer

Sarah Simpkins, 101, will graduate in May with a degree in early childhood education from Brightpoint Community College in Chester, Virginia. She is graduating along with her granddaughter, Halimah Shepherd-Crawford. 

Simpkins left college when she became pregnant and went on to marry and have 12 children. “So that I might inspire somebody else,” Simpkins said. “I returned to school. It was never out of my mind.”