High school graduation is a proud moment in any person’s life. It represents academic achievement, an obstacle overcome, and the beginning of a new stage in life.

For three neighborhood high school graduates, it’s much more than that. When they walk the stage it will be the culmination of a lifetime of work complicated by language barriers, long distance relationships and family trauma.

 

 

 

            Saul Manzano, 21, is unique in his class for being the oldest graduating senior at Hillcrest High School . He is also unique because of the positive choices he has made at critical moments in his life in order to succeed.

            His mom brought him to the from when he was 17 to give him a better life. She had been traveling back and forth between the two countries for years, leaving Manzano to be raised by his loving grandparents.

            But life in wasn’t easy. The country is besieged by large, well-organized gangs, and Manzano was a member of one of these.

            "I was a bad guy," he says.

            At one point, an attack by a rival gang left his best friend dying in the street, while Manzano fled for his life amid rapid gun fire. It was right then and there, he says, that he decided something had to change.

            "I escaped, and that changed my life. I said to myself, ‘This is wrong, I need to be a good guy.’ When I came to a new country, I had to make a different life."     

            When he arrived in Dallas four years ago, he did just that. Even though he was a few years behind, he was allowed to enroll in school as a freshman.     

            But his problems didn’t just go away. Unable to speak the language and with no friends, he was teased when he tried to speak English in class. One day a stranger in need of directions approached him on the street. He was unable to help because he didn’t understand the question.

At that moment he made his second life-changing decision.

            "I got mad at myself. I said, ‘What am I doing here? I don’t speak English.’ I tried to really learn English and not speak Spanish for two years."

            Now he doesn’t care if people laugh when he speaks English, and says the experience has made him stronger.  Manzano says he wants to major in music education at Texas A&M Commerce or the University of North Texas so he can be a band director someday. It was his band director at Hillcrest who taught him to read music before he could even read a book.

            Now he plays the trumpet, trombone, guitar and drums.

            "I really thank Hillcrest for helping me. I thank everyone here that helped me. I feel wonderful that I made it, that everyone wanted me to graduate.

“I’m proud of myself. And my mom is so proud of me because I didn’t make it in , but I made it here."

 

 

 

            Wemo Magbegor, 17, also came to the from a foreign country, but unlike Manzano, he didn’t have to learn how to speak English. Born and raised in London , he had that base more than covered. But in stark contrast to his Salvadoran classmate, his surrogate parents weren’t doting grandparents.

            When Magbegor was 5, his dad’s visa expired, and he was forced to return to his native land, . Magbegor’s mom and sister joined his father, but given the choice to go to or stay in London , Magbegor chose the latter.

            During the next five years of his life, he was shuffled back and forth between his five aunts while he received an education at Turnham Primary School .

            "I went to a pretty much all-white school. I went through a lot of racism, and my aunts were very abusive."

            His mom returned when he was 10, and they moved to Dallas five years ago. Since that time, he has flourished in his new environment. He’s an offensive and defensive lineman on the varsity football team and is taking four AP classes this year. He expects to graduate with honors.

            Still, things started out rocky in the states. His mom worked around the clock. His classmates teased him for his British accent, and he says he didn’t do well in school until his sophomore year.

            "I was in regular classes, but then I started taking a lot of pre-AP classes. The teacher who really pushed me was [Sue] Blanchette."

            Magbegor says he was doing a project on the U.S. Constitution in her AP history class, but was having a hard time finishing it.

            "I wanted to drop the class. I was not into doing it. But she wrote a note to my counselors saying, ‘Don’t let him drop.’ I thought she hated me and just wanted me to fail."

            Over the next few months, as she helped him prepare for the AP exam, he realized the opposite was true, that she wanted him to succeed.

            "She said I had potential but just needed a little more confidence."

            He admits that finishing the project was the perfect confidence builder.

            When he looks back on his life, he’s glad he chose the more difficult paths. Even though it resulted in hardship, it forced him to strive to achieve more.

            "I’ve had to be self-sufficient. Going through everything I’ve been through just showed me anything can happen if you have faith and pray about it."

            Magbegor plans to attend the University of Texas . He wants to be a pediatrician.

           

            As the captain of the varsity cheerleading squad, Mallory Garmon exudes self-confidence and, well, cheer.

            But her high school experience, and even her elementary and junior high years, have been clouded by the constant fear of family tragedy.

            That fear was realized on the first day of school her sophomore year.

            For the past seven years, her mom had been battling breast cancer. After going into remission for four years, the cancer returned when Garmon was in seventh grade. The next year, the cancer spread to her mom’s back. When Garmon was in ninth grade, her mom went through aggressive chemotherapy.

            "She was always doing chemotherapy or radiation, but she always led a normal life," Garmon says. "Usually, she would be down one day, but she would always bounce back. But this time, she stayed sick. I couldn’t even look at her without crying. Deep down, I knew it was different this time."

            Her mom was in a coma when school started her sophomore year and didn’t survive the first day of school. Her brother, Greg, was a senior at that time. Garmon says he helped her realize she had to carry on through the pain.

            "Halfway through the first day of school, I was told that she had died. The next day, I was going to stay home from school, but he said, ‘Why are you going to stay home? The funeral’s not for a couple of days.’ He was a big inspiration. He never used it as an excuse."

            She says she realized that people face tragedy all the time and that she could either use her mother’s death as a crutch or use it to make her stronger.

            "It was tough. A lot of times I didn’t want to do my homework. But I just remembered that Mom would have wanted me to do well."

             Garmon says she expects to major in fashion design at the University of Texas .