The Road to Perseverance
By: Ellie Gosselin
Stephen Cannell
Stephen's problem was that he failed almost all of his classes up to fourth grade and had a hard time learning. He never knew why he couldn't understand what the teacher was teaching. After he failed fourth grade he was then asked to leave that school and to transfer to a different one. Later he enrolled at a prestigious private high school, but it wasn't any better. He flunked tenth grade and was once again, asked to leave. Stephen then eventually graduated and the bottom of his class. Many years after having to be called dumb and stupid, at the age of thirty-five he discovered that he had dyslexia. For college, he earned a football scholarship in 1961 which brought him to the University of Oregon. Later he lost the scholarship because of his bad grades. He met a professor who wrote stories, which then changed his whole life just because Stephen met the professor. He solved his problem by meeting the professor and creating a bunch of scripts that made a ton of money.
Jackie Robinson
Jackie Robinson was an amazing baseball player. Unfortunately at the time blacks and whites were separated. Later a guy named Branch Rickey, the president of the Brooklyn Dodgers chose Jackie to help integrate major league baseball. Branch told Jackie that there was going to be some tough times ahead of them. He made Jackie promise not to fight back when the fans would react negatively towards him. Despite the racial abuse, he had a great start on the Royals. Successfully he was leading the International League with a .349 batting average. This led to him getting a promotion with the Dodgers. Jackie was the first African American player in Major league baseball but, he kept being made fun of and harassed. One of the games the Philadelphia Phillies team and coach were shouting disrespectful things to Jackie. Other teams would threaten to sit out rather than play the Dodgers including some of his teammates. Although the coach informed the teammates that he would trade them sooner then he would trade Jackie. The loyalty of the coach set the tone for the rest of Jackie's career. Eventually many other people stood up for him too. He changed baseball completely by letting blacks to play baseball with everyone else and that they're no different.
Jimmy Valvano
Noah Galloway
Citations
http://www.jimmyv.org/about-us/remembering-jim/jim-valvano-timeline/
http://www.biography.com/people/jackie-robinson-9460813#a-voice-for-african-american-athletes
Inside Every Daydream was a Hollywood Script (Story)