Student success stories are a great way to showcase your school’s mission and values. They inspire students to push their boundaries and dream big.
They also serve as a beacon of hope, telling them that if their peers can do it, they can too. Whether through transforming advising processes or access to student success tools, schools can help students succeed.
Jane’s Story
Jane is a student in year 12 who has cerebral palsy. In consultation with her parents, the school is arranging for a range of therapy to be provided in school. These will include occupational and speech therapy, with regular consultation with the visiting specialist education teacher. A variety of observational and functional assessments will also be undertaken to assist in planning, timetabling and rationalising Jane’s disability services at school.
At Lowood, she finds conditions difficult – cold rooms, thin food and harsh treatment from the headmistress, Miss Temple. Her life changes dramatically when she befriends an older student, Helen Burns. During a class session Jane makes an error in her stance and receives a sharp lashing. Helen later explains to Jane that she should forget the incident and move on.
Directed by Oscar-nominated Tia Lessin (HBO’s Trouble the Water), The Janes is a riveting, urgent history of women who founded and ran Chicago’s abortion counseling service, which helped more than 11,000 women before Roe v Wade. Kaplan portrays the members of the Janes not as superheroes or Amazon warriors, but as ordinary housewives, students and young radicals, who were willing to risk their lives for a woman’s most essential freedom.
Mike’s Story
Mike is a former Philadelphia police officer and Marine Corps veteran. Calm and calculating, he now works as a security guard, private investigator, head of security, cleaner and violent fixer for Gustavo Fring and Saul Goodman to financially support his daughter-in-law Stacey and granddaughter Kaylee.
On one of his “muscle” jobs, Mike is employed by Daniel Wormald (“Pryce”) to protect him during a drug deal with Nacho Varga. Although Mike has no weapon, he remains calm and controlled during the encounter.
Mike then reveals his past to Stacey, including how he participated in corrupt activities on the force and broke his son Matt into the same world of gangland corruption. After two of their colleagues were murdered by vengeful gangbangers, Mike left the force and moved to Albuquerque to be near his family.
When Gus asks Mike to assist him against the Salamanca drug cartel, he agrees. In return for a large payment, Mike secretly points police to Lalo’s car and its ties to the murder of Fred the money wire clerk. Jimmy uses this information to accuse police of witness tampering, enabling him to win Lalo’s release on bail.
Liam’s Story
Liam was a physically active, full of life boy who loved playing PlayStation with his friends. But when he was diagnosed with leukaemia everything changed for him. He was immediately escalated to very high risk and he began to lose weight, gain hair and have trouble sleeping.
He started to feel isolated, he was struggling with his family and school work. He even started having thoughts of suicide. But Miss Laura connected him with one-on-one therapy and a support group, and helped him find coping strategies to help manage his feelings.
Inspired by a real WW1 diary, and revisiting characters from her bestselling books, Ann Victoria Roberts has created this tale of love and loss, and the effects of the past on the present. This book explores empathy and resilience and explains a difficult concept such as war in a way that is relevant to young readers. It also encourages children to seek support if they are having difficulties. Suitable for Year 3-7.
Aisha’s Story
After Aisha was rescued from her traffickers, she was given a home in a Causeway safe house. She was referred onto the Bright Future scheme, a job and training programme aimed at helping survivors back into work.
Aisha is one of the most respected narrators of hadith, a collection of reports on the teachings and practices of Islam. She was the first Muslim woman to recite the entire Qur’an, and helped many people understand it.
The story of her child marriage has been used as propaganda by both Shiite and Sunni Islamists, igniting anti-Muslim violence and political rows across the world. But according to Little, a leading expert in hadith scholarship, the report is an eighth-century historical fabrication.
Little reconstructed the chains of narration for the various accounts of Aisha’s early marriage, using shared words and phrases as clues to identify their common origin. He found that they derived from a single, simple formulation which was later expanded by Hisham. His analysis reaffirmed the Western scholarly consensus that the Aisha hadiths are not historically reliable.
Lucas’ Story
Lucas was a sweet boy with big hugs, crazy laughter and a beautiful smile. He loved before anything else and it was evident in everything he did. He didn’t see disability, gender, race, celebrity, rich or poor – he just saw people to love. He made everyone feel better in his presence and he never left anyone alone.
Shannon credits Children’s Mercy Home Care for helping Lucas overcome many challenges. Children’s Mercy Home Care provides nursing services to children discharged from the hospital for a variety of medical diagnoses. Registered nurses make regular visits to the family’s home in Lone Jack, Missouri, to administer NG tube feedings and monitor the child’s weight.
On her small island, Caitlyn (a fifteen-year-old heroine) befriends outsider Lucas. She feels drawn to him because he is a simple, untainted outsider with both pure and animalistic instincts that set him apart from her other friends. They both struggle to accept the island’s prejudice against outsiders and work hard to earn a positive reputation. The story explores how one person can have drastic and powerful influences on small communities.