A commencement ceremony beside the seaside is beautiful, but a group of elementary and junior high school graduates from Taipei County will go a step further, graduating in a ceremony they will remember for the rest of their lives. A total of 101 graduates from seven elementary and junior high schools in Kungliao township, Taipei County, are scheduled to receive their diplomas from Principal Chang Po-tsang of the Homei Elementary School in Kungliao at an underwater commencement slated for Saturday. The graduates will first snorkel out for about 100 meters to a floating command bridge, where they will then dive underwater to get their diplomas, according to Chang. The children have been practicing since May to prepare for the underwater commencement. Apart from the students from Homei Elementary and Fulien Elementary schools, which are located by the seaside, some of the 101 graduates are first-time swimmers, according to Chang. Homei Elementary School was the first school in Taiwan to have an underwater commencement, an event has been well-received by the entire Homei community, a fishing village near deep water in which coral, fish and plants are both abundant and magnificent, Chang said. Almost all the students of the Homei school come from homes dependent on the fishing industry, so none of them are strangers to the sea, he added. 