She grew up in a home rampant with drugs. Now this Pierce County student is graduating
Standing in her graduation gown in front of her Graham home Friday, Bree Thom waited for a caravan of staff members from Bethel Acceleration Academy to pull up to greet her.
They were there to deliver her diploma — something that just a couple years ago she wasn’t sure she’d get.
“I don’t think it’s really clicked in yet that I’m done — it’s real,” Thom, 18, told The News Tribune.
One year ago, Thom was in a different place.
On Christmas Eve 2019, she found herself driving around a Walmart parking lot while a family friend shot up heroin in the backseat.
“I remember I just looked in the little rearview mirror, and I see her in the backseat nodding off,” Thom said. “Like, she could die, she could overdose, and then what would I do? ... That was the point when I was like, ‘Wow, I don’t want to do this.’”
Thom grew up in Olympia, where she said she was living in a bad household and drugs were used frequently. Traditional public school wasn’t working for her, and she was getting in trouble with teachers and staff.
At 15, she moved to live with family in Spanaway but faced the same problems.
“Living in a house with with that, you have to partake. I never did drugs, but it definitely fell on me,” Thom said. “So it would be, ‘Oh, go run this to somebody. Oh, go drop this off. Oh, can you go do this deal for me?’”
Bree enrolled in Bethel Acceleration Academy in 2018.
BAA is a program that helps students ages 16-21 who are at-risk of not earning a high school diploma or who wish to return to school after a gap in their education. The program works with students on their studies throughout the day and on the weekends. Currently, 234 students are enrolled in the program, said interim academy director Diana Solis.
“We really serve a lot of students who can’t really follow a traditional school schedule, or some of them are parents,” Solis said. “Some of them have just not had success in a traditional setting, and they need something a little bit different.”
At first, Thom said she didn’t take BAA seriously. But after that Christmas Eve in the car, she said she thought about her own younger siblings who were struggling in school and wanted to make a change.
“You definitely become a product of your environment because that’s what you see,” Thom said. “And so, once I realized that they’re doing bad, it kind of woke me up, and I’m like, ‘Oh wow, it’s really generational.’ Like my grandparents, my parents, my siblings — nobody is making the change to break the chains, so I need to. I need to fix that.”
Thom started focusing on her studies, but in February 2020, after a physical altercation at her home, she called Starr Phillips, a BAA staff member. Phillips, sensing Thom needed her help, went and picked her up.
“From then she took me to her home and that’s when it all changed,” Thom said.
Thom has been living with Phillips and her children for the past 10 months, including Israel Phillips, who is also a BAA graduate.
“This is the first clean-and-sober house I’ve ever lived in in my 18 years,” Thom said. “That’s wild.”
Thom even asked Phillips if she would adopt her, and Phillips said the answer was an immediate yes.
“She was my kid when she came home with me,” Phillips said. “I had already decided.”
Thom said she will be attending Tacoma Community College in January and wants to become a civil rights lawyer. She likes to argue, she said.
Phillips said she’s proud of Thom and her journey.
“It’s such an honor to watch someone become who they are,” she said.
Thom encouraged other students who feel that they can’t graduate to keep working toward it and hopes the program can help others.
“I did not graduate on time, I did like five or six months late — but it still happened,” she said. “Late is better than never.”
Solis said the majority of BAA students have tremendous life challenges but also have resilient spirits. Thom is a great example.
“You can tell that she has big dreams,” Solis said. “And this is just the first step in her journey of success.”
This story was originally published December 12, 2020 at 7:15 AM.
