Troy Simon (Urban League College Track, 2012) at the White
House Forum for College Completion. Troy had the opportunity
to introduce First Lady, Michelle Obama.
Student Bio:
TROY SIMON
In Young in America: New Orleans, an anthology of pieces
by Urban League College Track students, Troy Simon
writes: “There’s no way to run from this world. The only
thing we can do is face it and overcome our biggest
challenges.”
Troy’s challenges were bigger than most. At the age of 12,
Hurricane Katrina swept through New Orleans, scattering
Troy and his family. They did not reunite until a week and a
half later, in the Houston Astrodome. His childhood home
as he knew it gone, Troy relocated to Texas. In the year
after the hurricane, as his hometown took on the immense
task of rebuilding, Troy began his own uphill climb. He
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East Palo Alto
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Oakland
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San Francisco
began to learn to read and write.
Essentially illiterate at 12, Troy realized he had no time
to spare. “As for me,” he writes in Young in America: New
Orleans, “I am changed, have let myself be changed, by
education.” Putting his faith in his teachers, dedicating
himself to education for the first time, Troy not only pulled
himself up to grade level but discovered, along the way, a
true love and knack for writing.
As he puts it, “I had been held in silence for so long, and
writing has torn that silence out of me and allowed me to
express myself. I’m driven to write because I have something
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Los Angeles
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New Orleans
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Colorado