Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: FRIDAY, June 23, 1995 TAG: 9506230042
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: B-1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: LESLIE TAYLOR STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: LENGTH: Long
They strolled in, rather than marching.
Seven of them, dressed in maroon caps and gowns, gold tassels swinging. The valedictorian, chewing gum. The salutatorian, a no-show.
The 1994-95 graduates of Total Action Against Poverty's ``Project Success.''
Their lives are a mix of family dysfunction, juvenile delinquency, poverty and affluence. They shared a distaste for the traditional school setting and a strong desire to drop out.
But they also shared recognition that without a high school diploma or its equivalent, life would have more limits than they cared to stomach. Thursday, they received their general equivalency diplomas - earned through Project Success - at a ceremony at Virginia Western Community College in Roanoke.
``There's so much potential here,'' Sara Holland, TAP's director of youth services, said to seven of the 10-member graduating class. Three did not attend.
``I hope and pray you won't stop with this. Everyone here has the ability to go to college. You've gotten your GED with a whole lot of obstacles.''
The class included a fifth-grade dropout, a 17-year-old whose mother took off and left him virtually homeless, a young man with a learning disability.
``These are some kids who had some real problems,'' Holland said. ``In some of these cases, family situations make it almost impossible for them. Many of them were indulging in an adult lifestyle before they were mature enough to handle it.
``It's a side of dropping out that a lot of people don't realize.''
The youngest
For Vanessa Underwood, school was an obstruction that kept her from living as old as she felt - much older than her 15 years.
Her mother had her when she was 17, then had three more children, all girls, now 14, 13 and 8.
As the oldest, Vanessa played head of the household while her mother worked. She said she grew up fast.
In the sixth grade, Vanessa fell in with the wrong crowd at school - youngsters who found the streets an escape from problems at home and school just as problem-ridden as home.
Vanessa skipped days at a time, missing so many that one year she had to re-enroll three times. She ran away repeatedly, only to return and threaten to run again if forced back into school.
Vanessa - barely into her eighth-grade year at Lucy Addison Aerospace Magnet Middle School - wanted to drop out. Sara Holland stepped in.
``We negotiated with the [Roanoke] school system that if she were willing to attend [Project Success] and would attend, they would give their permission,'' Holland said. ``I couldn't accept her otherwise because of her age.''
Vanessa entered the program last November. She was placed in pre-GED instruction, 31/2 hours a day of one-on-one tutoring. She made ``tremendous advances,'' Holland said.
Vanessa passed her GED exam this spring.
``This has been the best thing for me,'' she said. ``This gave me some self-respect and self-esteem. Before I had none. I just thought I was a nobody, a nothing.''
She is happy, despite the rush to independence. She is working full time at a Roanoke motel, cleaning rooms.
It is enough, for now.
``I love working,'' she said. ``I know it's not the best job in the world, but I love it. I love the sense of freedom.''
The valedictorian
Robert Meador slouches in a chair, a baseball cap pulled tightly over his freshly buzz-cut hair. His eyes are nearly hidden - his preference.
His appearance and deadpan manner belie the potential that teachers and counselors say he possesses.
But it reflects the labels that he says have been heaped upon him - ``loser,'' ``troublemaker,'' ``someone who would never amount to anything.''
He slept through his classes at Salem High School, mouthed off at teachers, was caught doing drugs. School suspensions became routine.
Last fall, he spent 12 days in Coyner Springs Juvenile Detention Center on a drug-possession charge. He was released on probation.
One condition of his release was that he stay in school. He tried, but couldn't.
Robert was ``doing absolutely zero in class,'' said Betsy McClearn, assistant principal at Salem High. She asked if he was interested in getting his GED through Project Success. With his mother's approval, he dropped out of Salem High and enrolled in the program.
Robert was ready for the GED exam in six weeks. But shortly after taking it, he was back in Coyner Springs for violating probation.
``I got the [exam] results while I was locked up,'' Robert said. He had passed with the highest score of the 1994-95 Project Success class.
``After that, I thought I'd better straighten up, get serious about my life,'' he said.
Project Success probably was Robert's best alternative, McClearn said. Robert agrees.
``It prepared me for life, for getting a job, getting into a real-world type thing,'' he said. ``I don't think I'm all the way ready, but I'm getting there.''
The oldest
Three years ago, Michael Zimmerman was thrown out of William Fleming High School in Roanoke after a fight with a classmate.
Michael said he tried to get into other schools but could not for lack of space or money - or because the schools simply didn't want him. So, at 16, he dropped out.
He went to work, unloading trucks at an apparel manufacturing company, ringing cash registers at a fast-food restaurant.
His parents pushed him to ``make something of myself,'' he said. He wanted the same, more for his son - born when Michael was 15 - than for anyone else.
``He was the whole reason I was trying to get back in school after they kicked me out,'' Michael said.
It was his son and the desire to play ``more of a role in his life'' that inspired Michael, 19, to enroll in Project Success. He figured a GED could lead to a better job, possibly college, possibly the Air Force.
He finished the program in one month.
``People used to say I wasn't going to amount to much,'' he said. ``I always knew I would prove people wrong.''
by CNB