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Xavier Rivas finished his first year of kindergarten in Florida and was looking forward to his kindergarten graduation when he got some bad news. His graduation was scheduled on the same day as a family wedding back in Puerto Rico. He decided to make the best of it, packed his cap and gown for pictures in Puerto Rico, and boarded the airplane.

His mom, Janeiry Rivas, said of Xavier’s flight, “He’s very social, so he was telling everyone how he missed his graduation. So he was like very, very hurt about that.”

During the 2.5-hour flight, the crew approached Janeiry and said they’d like to do a little something special for their buddy Xavier. Half an hour before graduation the five-year-old heard a message over the intercom.

The flight attendants introduced Xavier and told the other passengers, “He is missing his graduation, his Kindergarten graduation today. And because he chose to fly Frontier instead, we are giving him his graduation ceremony on this flight.”

Xavier put on his cap and gown. The attendants played Pomp and Circumstance over the intercom system. And he walked up the aisle to cheers.

The entire way, passengers smiled at Xavier, gave him high-fives, and filmed him. At the end, the attendants gave him some gifts and once the plane landed he got to meet the pilots in the cockpit.

Janeiry said, “He was just beyond excited, like his face lit up…He was super super excited, getting high fives from people and getting cheered on.”

Check out the vidoe of Xavier’s 35,000-foot graduation embedded below: