Word: shawn
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...year ago, Shawn Sturgill's educational prognosis was grim. He was one of the main subjects of TIME's April 2006 cover story on America's epidemic of high school dropouts, which examined the lives of those who had left school or were on the cusp of leaving in Shelbyville, Ind. When I first met Shawn, 18, most of his friends had already dropped out, and he himself was so far behind on credits that he had to shuttle between regular classes and a credit recovery program that felt a bit like detention. Not only was he was unable...
...liked Shawn, a big, kind-hearted kid. But I wasn't sure that he was going to make it to graduation. There were just too many pressures and too few role models. He needed to work long hours after school to make money. His family was supportive, but his father and two of his siblings had dropped out before him and were making decent money burying fiber-optic cable. It would have been all too easy for him to join them...
...Where so many others would have given up and given in, however, Shawn found just enough cussedness to will himself to the finish. He graduated in December - months before he thought he'd be able to - after playing an aggressive game of academic catch...
...That talk, says Superintendent David Adams, has led to action. "The attention has allowed us to try things that we wouldn't have tried before," he says. Indeed, Shawn's turnaround is due in part to aggressive new strategies that Shelbyville schools are using to keep kids like Shawn on the right path. They've brought their credit recovery program into the digital era, adopting NovaNET, an online software program that Shawn was able to run through at his own pace and on his own schedule. The high school also opened a separate Student Achievement Center, located at a local...
...Shawn, graduating has had immediate benefits. He went to the high school to request an early copy of his diploma so he could show it off at Christmas. And his parents threw him a graduation party at Shelbyville Community Church, where he landed not only about $350 in gifts, but also a promise from his dad to pick up half the car payments on Shawn's '99 Grand Prix GT. Even better was the fact that Shawn got hired to lay cable with his father and older brother, at a pay rate - $15 an hour - that was much higher than...