{"id":2971,"date":"2010-12-06T19:05:00","date_gmt":"2010-12-07T00:05:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/flsentinel.com\/?p=2971"},"modified":"2010-12-06T19:05:00","modified_gmt":"2010-12-07T00:05:00","slug":"academy-that-gives-students-a-second-chance-graduates-its-first-class","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/flsentinel.com\/?p=2971","title":{"rendered":"Academy That Gives Students A Second Chance Graduates Its First Class"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><strong>BY IRIS B. HOLTON<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong>Sentinel City Editor<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong> <\/strong>On Thursday, December 9<sup>th<\/sup>, the Academy of Excellence will host its first graduation exercises. Seven of the fifteen students who began the class in March will graduate.<\/p>\n<p>The ceremony will take place at the C. Blythe Andrews, Jr., Public Library, (formerly College Hill Library, corner of E. Dr. M. L. King, Jr., Blvd. and N. 26<sup>th<\/sup> Street), at 9:30 a.m. The graduates are <strong>Ms. Lydia Burns, Ms. Amber Hicks, Ms. Ashaunte Singletary, Kendredge McKinnon, <\/strong>and <strong>Edwin Gay. <\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong> Ms. Hicks <\/strong>and<strong> Ms. Burns <\/strong>have applied and been accepted at Hillsborough Community College. Others have expressed an interest in learning a trade.<\/p>\n<p>The students, who range in age from 17 to 29, came to the Academy with varied backgrounds, including referrals from the Juvenile Justice System, a teenage parent, and some formerly incarcerated.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Ms. Angelica Norton, <\/strong>founder of the Academy of Excellence, said launching the school was her way of giving back to the community. \u201cI grew up in College Hill as the second of seven children, and I was a teenage mom.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>However, <strong>Ms. Norton<\/strong> came to realize the importance of having an education. She enrolled in an online high school [private]program entitled, Stepping Stones, a nationally accredited online high school diploma program.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Tre Lawson, <\/strong>and<strong> Ms. Ushanda Pauling,<\/strong> Project Facilitator, gave the students instructions and educational guidance. <strong>Ron Anderson,<\/strong> of Project Now, purchased their cap and gowns, <strong>Toni Cruz,<\/strong> CPA, <strong>Dayle Greene, Lynnette Stallworth, <\/strong>and<strong> April Griffin,<\/strong> school board member were instrumental in launching the program. The Hope Learning  Center served as its first location until it moved to the library.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThe Academy works with teens and adults who have been forced out of traditional school models or who are in familial situations that required them to leave school to take on other roles,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n<p>The next academy will begin on January 24<sup>th<\/sup> with students classes being held Monday through Thursday from 10 a.m. to 1 p.m. Orientation will be held on January 18<sup>th<\/sup>.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Ms. Norton <\/strong>said the enrollment capacity is 15 students and enrollment is on a first come, first serve basis for the free program. She plans to have two classes per year.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Ms. Norton <\/strong>said, \u201cThe Academy of Excellence will help take our young people out of the shadows of uncertainty and into a place of clarity and hope.\u201d[\/private]<\/p>\n<p><strong> <\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>BY IRIS B. HOLTON Sentinel City Editor On Thursday, December 9th, the Academy of Excellence will host its first graduation exercises. Seven of the fifteen students who began the class in March will graduate. The ceremony will take place at the C. Blythe Andrews, Jr., Public Library, (formerly College Hill Library, corner of E. Dr. [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"pmpro_default_level":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2971","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-local-news","pmpro-has-access"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/flsentinel.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2971","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/flsentinel.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/flsentinel.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/flsentinel.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/flsentinel.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=2971"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/flsentinel.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2971\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/flsentinel.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=2971"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/flsentinel.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=2971"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/flsentinel.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=2971"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}