At Visions’ 2024 graduation ceremony, senior Jesus L. stood on the Memorial Auditorium stage and gave a speech about his time at Visions. He spoke of his academic journey, his gratitude for staff, and his plans for the future, but what the crowd of peers, friends, and families didn’t know was that Jesus shouldn’t have even been on the stage that day.

A few years before graduation, Jesus and his family were unhoused. They had moved to California during the height of the pandemic, and Jesus was struggling with distance learning in his traditional brick and mortar school. Only a freshman, that should have been the time that Jesus was putting his graduation goal in motion, but life circumstances and lack of support prevented him from getting on the right track.

“While school was in distance learning, I found it hard to focus on school and many things in general,” shares Jesus. “When life had settled around the start of my 11th-grade year, I had decided to get back into school as I knew it was necessary. I enrolled in a local high school and I found the treatment of me as a student to be lacking. They had wanted to place me back into 9th grade and my graduation date was well beyond what I wanted.”

Jesus and his family eventually heard about Visions, and after only one interaction with Visions staff, knew it was the right fit for them.

“One phone call showed us more hospitality and understanding than we had experienced in my whole time coordinating with the local high school,” says Jesus. “They had me signed up for the next semester and that is when my journey at Visions started.”

A Second Chance

On paper, Jesus graduating on time looked impossible. Due to his difficulties at his former school, he was extremely credit deficient, and as an 11th grader, it looked like there was no way he would be able to catch up in time to graduate with his expected class.

But Jesus’ Independent Study Academy teachers, Jason Railing and Carolyn Foote, and counselors, Rija Gorkhali and Estrella Rosales, saw the potential in Jesus.

“Right from the start, Jesus showed remarkable motivation to achieve graduation,” says Rija. “When he realized that graduation [was] achievable, he seized the opportunity. Jesus dedicated himself wholeheartedly to his goal, not only aiming for graduation, but striving for more.”

While working with his teachers and counselors, Jesus felt respected, supported, and seen as an individual. The flexibility and personalized attention that he received afforded him access to important resources like school supplies and driver’s education, and helped put him back on track to graduate.

From Credit Deficient to Class of 2024 Graduate

Despite his remarkable comeback, what Jesus did wasn’t easy. He worked hard every single day to catch up to his peers, attending summer school, staying up late to finish his school work, and at one point, even completing 1-2 classes every week.

But Jesus’ efforts didn’t stop there. After receiving an email from Visions saying that he had been selected as one of the students for our reduced credit graduation, Jesus took this opportunity to strive for an even greater goal than graduating.

“This was an act of great grace given to me, and in my mind I couldn’t let such a thing go to waste,” shares Jesus. “Where before the goal was simply to graduate, my new goal was to go to college, which was never something I thought possible beforehand.”

With the support, resources, and time that Visions gave to Jesus, after a year and a half of hard work, he found himself graduating with the Class of 2024, heading to Rowan University on a scholarship, and sharing his story in front of thousands of people on graduation day (see below).

“My motivation to fix my grades was due to a variety of factors, but at the heart of it all was wishing better for myself. I saw what poverty can do to someone first hand. I had no money or resources to turn my life around any other way but education. If I was to achieve anything in life I had to start the journey.”