New Vision grad has much to look forward to
A quiet and soft-spoken young woman, Angel Silva has very definite ideas about what she wants to do with her life and how she wants to help people. She is very clear on this, even while recognizing the challenges she has overcome and those that she takes forward with her.
Her father, Shannon, is a construction worker who is disabled with a back injury and is facing a third surgery; her mother, Aubree, is a stay-at-home mom. And at age 18, Silva has eight younger siblings.
“We are a close family and all work to help each together,” she said. “When my dad got hurt, we did need government help. We also pulled together to make it work, and aunts and uncles and so many family members have added to our strength as a family.”
Silva will be graduating from New Vision High School in Post Falls, an alternative high school that provides one-on-one attention for students who aren’t thriving in larger schools. She acknowledges that she has been on the receiving end of bullying but has found her place at New Vision. A student described by one of her teachers as “a teacher’s dream,” she will graduate with a 3.5 GPA.
In high school, she has been active with Family Career Community Leaders of America and other activities. She has volunteered at a senior center, read to kindergartners and been involved with a number of other community service activities – work which in 2013 earned her the Post Falls Mayor’s Youth Award.
She plans to attend North Idaho College and then transfer to the John Jay School of Criminal Justice in New York to earn a doctorate in criminal psychology.
“I want to learn about the mind,” Silva said. “We all have the same mind, but we all see and evaluate things differently. I want to learn more about this.”
She is open in acknowledging that she has had some hard times with depression. Last year she told her mother she wasn’t feeling right, and her mother made an appointment for her to see a doctor. But just in advance of that appointment she found herself at school one day feeling overwhelmed and experiencing suicidal thoughts, thoughts which she shared with a school counselor. That counselor got Silva help immediately.
“I am so grateful,” Silva said, “because I certainly did not want to put my parents through that (harming herself). I have learned that even if things aren’t great at the moment, there is so much to look forward to. You need to open a window to let the light in, metaphorically.”
Her mother adds: “She is very brave. Hers has not been an easy path. She has risen above whatever happens and is such a wonderful girl. She perseveres.”
Silva credits her family’s ability to look on the bright side, no matter what. There is always another day to turn things around, to do better, to help someone else.
Once again, her mother explains it: “We stick together with loyalty and love, but I am amazed at how aspirational Angel and some of my other girls are. Here we are a blue-collar family, and they want to go out and change the world. I am so proud.”