Nearly 50,000 high-school seniors in Moscow will celebrate their last day of classes on Friday, while some 6,000 police and security guards will be dispatched to keep order at the annual festivities, a news report said.
The so-called Last Bell celebration, marking the final day of classes before exams start, will be held at 1,041 schools in the capital, where a total of 49,086 seniors will finish their studies, a Moscow educational department spokesman said, Interfax reported.
"Many schools have their own traditions: Graduating students dance the waltz with their parents, present school libraries with their favorite books, give gifts to first-graders, plant trees and flowers in the schoolyard," the spokesman said.
About 4,000 police officers and more than 2,000 private security guards and police auxiliaries will be on duty Friday to help maintain public order, a Moscow police spokesperson told Interfax on the eve of the celebrations.
Schools must wrap up their celebrations by 9 p.m., the education department spokesman said, but teenagers frequently take the party into town after school doors close.
