Drake dedicated his high school diploma to his mother who is a retired teacher, when he recently graduated 10 years after dropping out of high school. Drake dedicated his high school diploma to his mother. The 25-year-old Canadian rapper - who dropped out of school 10 years ago - received his high school diploma earlier this month after months of hard work and paid tribute to his mother in an emotional speech. He said: "I can honestly say that, this piece of paper, I'd like to dedicate to my mother, because she's a retired teacher and always wanted me to graduate. And I think I'll sleep a little better tonight knowing that I found a way to follow through." Drake - who dropped out when he was just one credit short of graduating at the age of 15 to pursue a role on the Canadian teen drama series 'Degrassi: The Next Generation' - also gave some advice to his fellow graduating class and revealed how happy he was to have finally gotten his diploma. He said: "It's not necessarily about the books that you'll read or the science or math equations that you'll do, because you may end up taking a path in life where a lot of the things that you'll learn you can't necessarily fully apply. What this is about today, for all of you, is about the art of following through." "I reached a point in my life where I saw that there aren't material things that can give me the excitement that I'm looking for. There's a void, a gap in my life that I needed to fill. It was the fact that I had left a gaping whole in my story following through."