Determined Student Dies on Way to Graduation

A Houston student who put in extra hours to graduate from high school died in a car crash yesterday while driving to the ceremony, the Houston Chronicle reports. Identified by friends as Omar Rodas, the student died on Interstate 45 only two hours before graduation. He was wearing his graduation gown and cap at the time, MyFox Houston reports. "He wasn't going to make it at first, but he did it," says a friend of Rodas' late surge for school credits. "He was really excited that all his hard work had paid off." Now a fellow student at Klein Forest High School has set up a GoFundMe page to help Rodas' parents with funeral costs, KTRK reports. "It's really sad for what happened," a woman connected to Rodas tells KHOU. "One minute everybody's happy and the next minute something really hits you really hard." (More fatal accident stories.)