Life Skills Center helps change Dayton teen’s life

Life Skills Center of Dayton has greatly helped a local resident as she prepares for her nursing career.
Whitney McGary, 19, of Dayton, left Col. White school in Dayton in March 2004.
“I had to be on bedrest at the end of my first pregnancy,” McGary said.
She spent the next two years at home before deciding to return to school.
“I was taking care of my child and became pregnant again,” McGary said. “But I wanted to go back to school.”
McGary had to wait until she was 18 to reapply for school since she didn’t have a legal guardian.
“But I didn’t have enough credits to enroll,” she said.
That’s when McGary turned to Life Skills, an alternative education charter school which accommodates students ages 16-22 who are experiencing difficulties with the routine of traditional public schools.
In addition to her sons, Daquan, 3, and Antwain, 2, McGary also takes care of her 14-year-old brother and two sisters, 11 and 7, in a two-bedroom apartment in Dayton. She was temporarily awarded custody of her siblings.
“I haven’t seen anyone had to take on that much responsibility,” Administrator James Brown said. “She’s just a great kid, a star student.”
“She is remarkable and a really outstanding young lady,” said her teacher, Tonjua Wilkes.“To assume what she had and to keep going has been totally amazing.”
McGary was recently certified as a state tested nursing assistant through assistance from the Miami Valley Youth Career Services and is hoping to graduate from Life Skills in December.
In addition, McGary said the school helped her deal with setting up the funeral of her grandmother, who died from cancer in March.
“She was able to make sure the grandmother who raised her had a good funeral,” Brown said.