Young, single mother finds support

Go back to 2007 and you will see a young girl attending Bridger Alternative High School. She is having a very difficult time balancing school work, attending to a new baby, working a 30 hour a week job, and trying to sort out her relationship with the baby’s father.

She knows she wants better for her daughter than she had growing up. Her parents are not available for support and she is living in a friend’s basement with several other teenagers.

She was referred to The Partnership Project, a signature program of Thrive, and her life’s course begins to change. She is partnered with a Family Support Worker and she begins to see her potential. She moves into her own place which creates a chaos free living environment for her and her child. She can focus on school work easier. She graduates from high school. She attends parent education classes and career counseling. With support and encouragement she begins to see herself differently. She decides she would like to be a teacher.

Now see this same young woman in 2009. After ACT’s, registration forms, financial aid forms, child care forms and work study forms she will be attending MSU this fall. She is the first person in her family to go to college. She glows when she speaks of her new potential and what this means for her daughter.

In her words:

“Without Thrive I would probably still be living in my friends basement which is not at all where I wanted to raise my beautiful, smart daughter. She deserves more than that. I don’t want to think about where I would be but now I know where they have lead me and where I am headed.”