After eight years of ducking and dodging prison politics, I was finally in a level two prison and walking to my first for credit college class.

I was walking with another student named Steve Rietz. I explained how I had made a decision to abandon being a criminal in exchange for going to college. It was the first long-term plan I had ever made in my life.

I told Steve that I thought I could earn a passing grade if I worked hard enough. He said that I should shoot for better than that. I argued that whether a doctor gets an A or a C, he’s still a doctor. He asked which doctor would I want working on me?

For sometime, Steve would not know how powerful that question would be. It haunted me. The fact was, that I did not believe that I was capable of earning an A. But he motivated me to put my all into my new class and I earned an A- in intermediate algebra!

Today with only four credits to go, I’m holding a 3.51 GPA. There are six A’s. Thank you Steve.