Dreaming of College from Skid Row

by Shannon Moriarty · 2009-11-30 12:04:00 UTC
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Kenneth Chancy is 17 years old. He is a high school honors student, the starting quarterback on the football team, and student body president. Oh - and until recently, he was a resident of the Union Street Rescue Mission in the heart of Skid Row.

CNN covered his inspiring story several weeks back. Chancy's homelessness was his secret. He would organize community service activities for the homeless on Skid Row and none of his high school classmates knew that he himself was living in a shelter.

Chancy's story - his courage, his drive - is extremely moving. So moving that it caught the eye of the highest paid running back in NFL history, Nnamdi Asomugha of the Oakland Raiders. The NFL star is pretty impressive himself; at 28, he runs a foundation, the Asomugha College Tour for Scholars, that takes talented inner-city kids on tours of college campuses they otherwise would never be able to see. According to CNN, he's helped get 25 teens into college over the last four years.

Once you hit play on the video below, you'll be glued to your seat. Kenneth Chancy's tenacity will make your day. And we can all learn a lesson from Nnamdi Asomugha's decency. Watching these lives collide will brighten up your Monday afternoon.

Shannon Moriarty has worked in various homeless shelters and service organizations around the country. She is a graduate student studying housing and urban policy at Tufts University.
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