OXFORD – Anything can be achieved with enough determination, no matter what the obstacle. Of this, 24-year-old Samantha Wackford is living proof.
In June, the young woman passed a high school equivalency exam to earn her General Education Degree. While this may not seem like a huge accomplishment for some, for the Guyana native who lost her sight after she was burned by acid, it has been no small feat.
In April of 2002, just two short weeks before she was set to graduate from high school in her homeland, “Sam” (as she is called by her friends), was the victim of an intentional attack, which both blinded her and left her permanently scarred.
After spending more than a year recovering, she moved to Boston. It was there that, while enrolled in an adult independent living program at the Carroll School for the Blind, she met Troy Wackford. The Oxford native, who was in the same program, had been diagnosed at a young age with Retinitis pigmentosa, a genetic eye condition which had caused his vision to gradually deteriorate over time.
It didn’t take long for the two to fall in love, and in October of 2007 they were married. Shortly after, the couple moved to Troy’s hometown.
Despite her loss of vision, Sam Wackford never lost sight of her goal of furthering her education.
“I wanted to get my GED,” she explained. And in September of 2008, she began working toward that goal. Her first step was to sign up for the Adult GED program offered through DCMO BOCES, which is how she met Instructor Anne Walters.
Walters recognized that, while Wackford’s was definitely motivated, she would need certain adaptive equipment to not only take the high school equivalency exam, but to prepare for it as well. She encouraged the determined young woman to contact Literacy Volunteers of Chenango County (LVCC).
“We utilize them on a regular basis, so we can have quicker successes,” explained Walters. While most Literacy Volunteer clients need assistance with reading and writing, Wackford’s area of need was math. Specifically, she needed someone who could read the problems to her while she worked out the solution using the adaptive tools. That is where LVCC Tutor Aleta Dunham came in.
For close to seven months, Wackford met weekly with Dunham. The sessions were sometimes so intense that they left both student and tutor mentally exhausted, but still Wackford persevered.
“We fed off her energy,” Dunham said.
During the same time, she also attended GED classes twice a week.
“She was very committed, very motivated, very hard working,” Walters said, of her former student’s efforts.
Taking the exam took in excess of two weeks, beginning on May 26 and ending on June 11. Even before she received the results of the test, Wackford was confident that she had passed.
“I invested a lot of time and effort, so I knew I did well,” she said. “Plus, I had a lot of great people on my side.” The graduate received official word that she had passed in the latter part of June.
“We are very proud of her,” said Kelly Sines, who serves as tutor-student coordinator for LVCC.
Now that she has earned her GED, Wackford intends to continue her education. Her plan, she said, is to move to Norwich so that she can begin taking classes at the local campus of Morrisville State College where she would like to pursue a degree in psychology.
“I believe I’d be a very useful tool in helping others overcome tragic situations,” she explained.