From a trash bag cape to a principal’s badge, Michael turned survival into service, and now he’s building the safe school he once needed. On the night Michael was taken from his mother, his biggest fear wasn’t the police car or the new house waiting somewhere else; it was losing the one steady thing in his life: T.A. Sims Elementary.
He insisted on staying with his younger brother, James, and promised himself he’d never leave him behind. He didn’t know what he wanted to “be” yet, but he was sure that school was the road out.
A state report from that night described him as bright and well-spoken, worried about whether he could stay in school and keep his spot in the gifted classes. Reading that now, it makes sense. School was where he could count on two meals, where he felt safe, and where effort turned into something. He took pride in being a GT kid, racking up good grades and favorite student awards, but nothing ever made it to the fridge at home.
Sometimes, his home life showed through anyway. On book-character day, he made a Harry Potter costume out of what he could find: an old pair of glasses, a black trash bag for a cape, a stick for a wand, and a marker drawn lightening bolt from a kind teacher. He won, which felt good, but standing next to kids in store-bought outfits also stung. He realized people were noticing the parts of his life he tried to hide, even inside his safe place. At home, he was more guardian than kid. He walked James to school every day, often making himself late.
He asked for spare change, sold small things at school, hid money from his mother, and stretched weekends on chicken sandwiches from church to keep them fed. Nothing in the house was secure; if it had value, it might vanish. Once, he got a guitar from a Christmas giveaway and fell in love with the idea of learning.
A week later, it was gone. He was told it had been stolen, but someone else in the house said it had been sold. Adoption changed everything. A family took Michael and James in, and for the first time, the future felt real. At thirteen, his parents sat him down and said he didn’t have to be a parent anymore; he could be a kid. That one sentence loosened a weight he’d carried for years. He jumped into life, sports, UIL, band, and schoolwork. His parents tried to pack a childhood into five years before college. The brothers traveled, saw six countries, joined camps, and tried things that once felt impossible.
Michael credits his parents’ love and standards, along with the teachers who believed in him, from T.A. Sims to Poetry Community Christian School, for shaping who he became. His parents didn’t let him settle. Once, his mother found a last-minute essay with a perfect score and returned it to the teacher to lower the grade because she knew he could do better. It wasn’t punishment; it was belief in his potential. Those moments taught him that effort and honesty travel farther than talent alone. He carried that lesson into his own career. Michael became a teacher and then an assistant principal, choosing Title I schools on purpose.
He sees parts of his story in the kids who slip into class hungry, tired, or scared, and he uses small hallway talks and quick lunch conversations to show them he cares about their lives, not just their grades.
He reminds them that school can be their safe place too, and that big goals can grow from hard soil. He hopes to widen his reach, not for a title, but to ensure more kids feel seen and supported the way he once needed.
