Woman graduates High School 80 years after dropping out

A 97-year-old US woman has only just received her High School diploma despite leaving school aged 17.

Ann Colagiovanni had to quit education during the US depression of the 1930s, but she returned to school earlier this year becoming the oldest member of the class of 2012 at Shaker Heights High School in Ohio.

Her name was printed on the certificate with the date stated as June 1934.

Her daughter, Emilia, told Fox 8 Cleveland: "When I told her she was getting a diploma, she sobbed as if a pain had been relieved from her heart. I never knew what it meant to her. She wanted this."