MIAMI (WSVN) - They’ve been inseparable since birth, and on Tuesday, two South Florida twin sisters walked down the aisle together at graduation to pick up their master’s degrees.
Shonda and Shalisha Witherspoon walked on stage together to receive their master’s degree in information technology from Florida International University.
The siblings said they are now ready to tackle the future together.
“That’s the best part, that we got through this journey together, and we are going to continue together pretty much in our careers, so this is a great moment for both of us and our entire family,” said Shalisha.
If it seems like déjà vu, it’s because the twins received their bachelor’s degree two years ago, becoming the first members of their family to graduate college.
“I know, it’s amazing,” said Shalisha. “You know, we are the first in our family to graduate, not only with our bachelor’s but now our master’s.”
Friends and professors said the pair are one of a kind.
“Yes,” the sisters said in unison.
They dress similarly, finish each other’s sentences and even choose to study the same courses.
But even though both are very similar, these identical twins said they complement each other perfectly.
“We also made the best study partners so, for example, our personalities are different,” said Shonda. “Shalisha, for example, is very proactive, whereas I’m a procrastinator, so she helps me make sure I do my homework on time and stuff like that, and things that I don’t understand, hopefully she does, and we really complement each other out.”
Shonda and Shalisha were home-schooled until they decided to join the FIU family. They fell in love with programming, and their hard work paid off, graduating with the highest GPA in the College of Engineering and Computing for the spring 2016 commencement — an achievement they said wouldn’t have been possible without their mom’s influence.
“I think because our mom instilled in us very early on — we were actually both home-schooled our entire lives,” said Shonda, “and from that, we just learned to have a love for education, and that’s why we knew we were going to get our bachelor’s, and then we knew we were going to get our master’s as well.”
The fact that they could walk the stage together for a pinnacle moment in their lives is a dream come true for these twins.
“To have fulfilled those dreams, it’s — there are no words to express how grateful I am,” said Shalisha.
“Same here,” echoed Shonda. “I’m speechless.”
The twins will also work together. They have accepted identical jobs as software engineers at IBM’s T.J. Watson Research Center in New York.
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