SAM Previous Winners

STATE WINNER
Name:  Rhonnett Merriweather
Category: Public Speaking
CIS program: CIS of Albany/Dougherty County
Grade:  12th

How Has CIS Affected My Life?
By Rhonnett Merriweather

Hello, my name is Rhonnett Merriweather. I am a student at the Performance Learning Center through Westover High School and in the Communities In Schools (CIS) system.  It is an honor being a part of the Communities In Schools family.

I describe CIS, or in my case the Performance Learning Center or PLC, as a family, because it is a small group of students and teachers working together for one common goal - student success!

CIS, through the Performance Learning Center, has improved my respect, patience, communication, and academic skills.  It helps all students to develop characteristics of respect and improved communication skills.

This organization has allowed me to expand my knowledge, maintain my focus for thinking “out of the box” while allowing me to work at my own pace.  The Performance Learning Center allows my peers and I to improve our skills by getting a head start with a strong use of technology.

Although I was raised by saying, “You can do all things in Christ which stregthens you,” I had begun to stumble upon doubts.  For awhile, it has seemed like every obstacle there could possibly be came to reduce my hopes.

Here I am seventeen years old, a senior with seventeen and one-half credits taking one literature course, one social studies course, three math courses, and one-half credit of computer applications.

I have been feeling like Edgar Allen Poe when he wrote “The Pit and the Pendulum” and described himself trapped in the pit! 

I too have been dreaming of success and wondering how I could achieve and if I could achieve on time.

In addition, to the stresses of being a senior actively pursuing an education and trying to graduate this year, there have been accumulating stressors at home too.

My mother is a single parent and struggling to try to get back on her feet.  First there was an injury from a car accident and then on July 5, 2005 our home was burglarized and burned to the ground.  We lost everything!

I have learned that you have to go through hard times to get to a higher place.  This is exactly where I am now.

Without the PLC, I might still be that seventeen year old with only seventeen and one-half credits.  Instead, I am a successful seventeen year old senior with a 3.8 GPA and high hopes of graduating in May.  I am in the top ten percent of my class and will graduate with a Dual Seal.

Through the Performance Learning Center, CIS has taught me that it is not what you do; it’s more how you do it. I am grateful for the opportunity that CIS has given me through my local Performance Learning Center.  Without this change, I would have not been able to graduate on time, nor would I have felt like I completed my purpose. 

My plans of becoming a forensic psychologist are just future memories in actual drive.

CIS is just showing the way!  I hope this program continues to change, create, and mold lives.  I want to come back and share my blessings.