Ashley Keen

Ashley Keen came to SAMMinistries’ Transitional Living and Learning Center with her two young children. There, as a single mother, she juggled their appointments and her own schooling. This Journeys of Hope video was made for the SAMMinistries annual gala.

The people helping her describe her follow-through. Through Restore Education, she finished an intensive eight-week GED program in three weeks, then enrolled in college prep. She took business communication workshops on Saturdays, too.

She doesn’t want her kids to grow up thinking they don’t have to finish school. She grew up in foster care, and she doesn’t want anything to stop them. “I just want them to be able to become the best that they wanna be in life,” she says. Her goal is to become a veterinary technician, because she loves math and science.

She and her children can stay for two years, she says, long enough to go back to school and get back on track. “Sometimes that little support can go a long ways in life,” she says. We also photographed Ashley with her high school equivalency certificate.