Whatever your philosophy or wherever you find yourself in the political spectrum, one thing I think we can all agree on is that we are living in difficult economic times. Most of us, if we haven’t experienced it ourselves, know someone who has lost his or her job or is otherwise struggling to keep up with increases in the price of living. Times are tough for many if not most of us.
In these difficult times, I think it’s important to remember to persevere rather than throw up our hands and quit. One could understand a teenager giving up on her future if she was abandoned by her parents, bullied at school, and even homeless. Who could expect any other result?
Don’t tell that to 18 year-old Dawn Loggins. She experienced all this and more and has been accepted to…Harvard?
This is such an inspiring story that I don’t want to give much more of it away. Really, I hope that everyone who reads this post reads this four part series by Alicia Banks for The Shelby Star. This story is nothing short of amazing.
There were three main takeaways I got from reading this series:
1. Dawn’s Personal choices made all the difference. Every cliché you have ever heard about becoming a successful person applies to Dawn Loggins (ex: “Luck is when preparation meets opportunity,” “when the going gets tough…” etc.). Rather than complaining about how unfair life is or blaming all her woes on the 1%,* or even her parents who abandoned her, she took it upon herself to improve her situation.
2. Sometimes one has to break the rules or violate the law to do the “right” thing. Dawn may not have been successful if the law was followed to the letter**. What if the principal or the school’s guidance counselor would have called DSS? Here’s an excerpt from part 2:
No one risked calling the Department of Social Services about Dawn, who was 17 at the time and had been homeless.
Those who cared about Dawn could have lost her to foster care if they alerted the authorities to her situation. Putnam was afraid Dawn wouldn’t be able to take classes she had lined up for her senior year at a different school.
Putnam and Kolton made sure Dawn had everything she needed: Clothes, food, shelter and Burns.
In situations like Dawn’s, Jane Shooter, assistant director for the county DSS, said social workers would have attempted to locate her parents and understand the situation. If they determined a child needed to be placed in foster care, their first attempts would be to find a safe guardian or foster family in the area. But that’s not always possible.
Members of the Burns community took care of one of their own on their own.
But was this the right thing to do?
“I can only say if you suspect a child is neglected or abused, by North Carolina law, you’re mandated to report it,” Shooter said.
Children in foster care age out of DSS’s protection when they turn 18 years old. Dawn turned 18 on Feb. 9.
“There’s nothing we can do now that she turned 18,” Shooter said.
3. Despite what some on the Left believe, regular people are more than willing to help others who are struggling without the government forcing them to do so via wealth redistribution (especially those who are doing all they can to help themselves). In addition to a few very key people who helped Dawn through high school, since this story was published, there has been an outpouring of support from regular people who want to help Dawn pay for her Harvard education.
Of course, Dawn’s story isn’t typical but neither is her work ethic. Was she successful despite her hardships or because of them? Was she smart because she studied hard or did she study hard because she was smart enough to realize doing so would be her most likely ticket out of poverty?
These chicken/egg questions aside, one thing is clear: we could all learn a thing or two about pursuing the American dream from a teenager by the name of Dawn Loggins.
Hat Tip: Neal Boortz
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