High school graduate at the age of 83, Apostolos Prodanas from Kilkis, talks to the ERT camera about his return to the desks after 71 years, that he finished primary school, his decision to become a student again and the support that he had from his teachers at Second Chance High School.

“I was proud at that time, that I was getting my diploma, that I saw all my classmates, the same, we all hugged, kissed, that we got our diplomas”, says moved Apostolos Prodanas, a graduate of Kilkis Second Chance High School.

With a love for music and reading, as he says, it all started from a poster in the cafe, in Pedinos of Kilkis.

“I saw an announcement in the coffee shop and I called the phone he had and they motivated me and I went, that is, my teachers, a certain Theodoros Ilias and Voulgarakis. They passed by here and told me to go there so they could register me, I didn’t pass, I kept saying I would pass and finally they passed by here and they registered me so I continued otherwise I might not have continued at all”, he comments. “A village woman once approached me and said to me ‘what do you want in high school, you’re 100 years old now…’ and I told her ‘even if I were 101, I would go,'” says Mr. Prodanas characteristically.

In 1952 he finished elementary school and 71 years later, in June 2023, he got his high school diploma and now, as he says, he has continued high school.