10/04/2025
MIDDLE SCHOOL: I got placed in Special Education, and they nicknamed it SPED. They prescribed me Adderall.
HIGH SCHOOL: My advisor said I wasn’t “college material.” The basketball team even hosted “Dumb Offs,” where another kid and I answered questions, and the loser got a plunger to the face. My GPA was 2.7. I wondered what the point of trying was when I’d been told my whole life that I wasn’t good enough.
COLLEGE: I got accepted to Slippery Rock University just because of track and field. I realized everything I had been told was nonsense. My GPA was 3.2, I made the Dean’s List, and I ranked 16th in the nation for the Division II Decathlon.
Now at 29 years old, I got accepted into Duquesne University’s Clinical Mental Health Counseling Program with a partial academic scholarship.
So why am I sharing this? Because there are millions of you who get put in a box before you even get the chance to show what you can do. You’ve got this. Keep pushing through. It gets better!
