Las Vegas Review-Journal, September 19, 2016: (Blog) Trying to Stay Positive While Living in Poverty

“Given the challenges of the children who attend the school at J Street and Washington Avenue — more than 90 percent grow up in poverty — if these students believe they can shape their own positive destiny, it certainly shows that when the going gets tough, the tough get going. These aren’t children who had control over the fact that the best meals they’ll eat are the ones provided by government-funded breakfast and lunch programs. Nor did they choose to grow up where dope dealers are commonplace. They certainly don’t ask parents to move them from one school to another, putting them behind in their studies. A third of enrolled students at Williams leave before year’s end; low-income families struggle to find housing. And students like Erica Conner’s 7-year-old daughter, Carviona, don’t ask for a bedroom located in the same car she rides to school, a 2009 Ford Taurus she frequently shares with her mother and sisters Carvia, 11, and Carvah, 4. Conner, who gets therapy for depression, showed me the car where the family often sleeps. While Carviona and younger sister Carvah seemed happy, Carvia, now in middle school, wasn’t.”