Since 1975, Ombudsman Educational Services has educated more than 200,000 at-risk students and students who have previously dropped out – and introduced them to all the opportunities a high school diploma provides.
Despite the challenges introduced by the pandemic during the Spring semester of School Year 2019-20, our Ombudsman students continued to thrive. We are so proud of how well our students have adapted to distance learning, and we want to recognize our Class of 2020 seniors who have worked hard to earn their diplomas during this unprecedented time.
At our Ombudsman PLUS program in Lorain County, Ohio, the Class of 2020 Seniors were given an assignment to write about their experience at Ombudsman. See what graduate Zack Johnson had to say about his time attending Ombudsman:
I learned that there was still hope for me and graduation. I learned that everyone has to battle a struggle every day and the best part about that is watching how those people overcome those obstacles.
There have been many great memories at my old highschool, and yet I feel I didn’t belong there. When I came to the Ombudsman program, I was nervous and hated changes in general. I was soon to get used to this new school because of how easy going it was and that I could go at my pace. The students and staff were all amazing and it reminded me of my old self seeing young and bold kids. There are more memories i will remember forever in the short time i was at that school than i will ever remember from ALHS.
Some of the greatest people i have ever met at the Ombudsman program have helped me achieve a goal that seemed so hard to reach because of my circumstances. I was so happy to be at that school because of how the teachers would know the mindset of the kids there and help those that were having a bad day. It was so much less drama and more focus on work than ever. I could trust the few people there because I knew that they were just trying to get by like I was.
The best part about that school was the ability to move on to the new lessons ahead of everyone else. That made everything easy for me and I felt I could go at my pace. It made schoolwork look easy and the amount of time you put into a lesson worth every second. I could wake up in a bad mood, walk into that school and realize that it wasn’t that bad and working through my frustrations got me in a better mood.
At the ombudsman program, I learned that there was still hope for me and graduation. I learned that everyone has to battle a struggle every day and the best part about that is watching how those people overcome those obstacles. Some of the nicest teachers i have ever met so far were always willing to help, even when you have a bad day. The teachers will not let you give up and they will find any way to get you to comfortably work on the assignments.
Some schools are hard for some kids, whether it be the people, the work, the time management or any other circumstances. Some people just need a space where they can work at their own pace and there is nothing or no one to bother them. The immense help that is there is something found nowhere else. Everyone deserves a good education. It’s just a matter of finding where your work can be put to the best of uses. The Ombudsman program helped me out of the ‘maze’ I was stuck in for a very long time.
