Sometimes it may look like the whole world is against you and you’re overwhelmed with a constant dose of bad luck, but it’s important to never give up and just keep going. That’s something that the 17-year-old Taquan Butler from Tallwood, Virginia Beach, has proudly proved.
The young man has been homeless after a horrible fire at his parents’ house, and also faced severe medical issues.
However, despite dealing with setback after setback, Taquan is now very proud to have graduated from high school, and rightfully so.
The family home of Taquan in College Park burned down back in 2007 due to a grease fire. It was devastating and all of the family’s possessions were lost in the flames. Unfortunately, the fire also proved devastating for the family’s financial status, as they were never really able to recover.
“After the fire, it was a bumpy road, with good times and bad times,” the young man told Pilot Online. “My mom always made sure we had clothes and food, but we kept falling back into the slump.”
After the fire occurred, Taquan, his mother, and his siblings were forced to roam the streets as they didn’t have a roof above their head anymore. The teen’s dad left the family one year before the fire and didn’t help out with the bills.
Taquan recalls that they were forced to sleep in vacant houses that were for sale, for example, because they simply had nowhere else to go.
“Our mom would wake us up in time for school, but first we cleaned the house so it looked like no one had been there,” he told.
It didn’t look like the future was getting any brighter for Taquan and his siblings, but the teen was determined to keep going and achieve great things in life.
“Through all that time, I knew that others had it worse than me, so I just kept going,” he said. “I had dreams, and I was striving for greatness.”
Unfortunately, Taquan’s mom was imprisoned in August of last year, and the then 16-year-old Taquan couldn’t possibly care for himself and his siblings. They all moved to Chesapeake to live with their grandmother.
Luckily, thanks to a federal law, schools have to provide for transport for homeless students to their classes. Taquan was assigned a taxi every day, and his positive attitude was quickly noticed by school officials.
Cecil Mainor, the assistant principal at the Tallwood High School, was particularly fond of him and wanted to hold him under his wings with a new mentorship program that the school started.
“I could see Taquan’s potential from the very first day I met him four years ago,” the assistant principal recalls. “We would get together and talk almost every week, always encouraging him to take as many AP classes as possible.”
When it finally seemed that Taquan’s academic future was safe, he was met with another setback.
The 17-year-old suffered from bowed legs, and they urgently needed to be fixed with surgery. The young man was forced to miss multiple months of school, and started urging his doctor to allow him to return to classes as soon as possible.
“I felt like I wasn’t learning,” he told about his time at the hospital and recovering home.
Taquan was active in the high school’s football team, the Tallwood Lions. Unfortunately, he also had a minor medical scare during a game. He felt a sudden and severe full body cramp, and couldn’t even make it off the field on his own. He was taken to a hospital, but luckily, the injury wasn’t severe and he was able to return to school the following morning.
This devoted student proves that when you have setbacks, it’s important to get back up on your feet.
He graduated high school with a 3.0+ GPA and seven AP classes.
“Taquan is an incredibly well-rounded student and model citizen, and he is highly respected by teachers and peers,” Tallwood counselor Stacy Kepple wrote.
Taquan even received an award for courage and perseverance from the Teens With a Purpose organization for youth empowerment.
The future was clear for this young man: college. He applied to a number of different institutes and already received over a dozen acceptance letters. He was able to choose between Alabama, Norfolk State University, and many others. He ultimately decided to go the Lynchburg College thanks to a scholarship.
“This has been my life, and there is a whole lot of love here, but I’m moving on,” Taquan said about leaving high school. “I have a plan, and college is the next step.”
What an inspiring young man!
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Source: Pilot Online
