Bridget Watkins

What happens to a dream deferred? If you ask Bridget Watkins, she will probably say they can still come true if you are willing to go for it. Thirteen years after she was denied a high school diploma by the Ohio Catholic school she attended as a teenager, Bridget completed her graduation requirements and received her diploma from William V. Fisher Catholic High School in Lancaster, Ohio, this past fall.

Bridget’s senior year did not quite go as she and her parents had planned. Expelled for fighting during that final year, Bridget attempted to make up her course work, even attending summer school, but the principal at the time maintained that she still had not completed all the work necessary for a diploma.

“I walked away upset, but it always really bothered me,” said Bridget. “I felt like I should have asked more questions and gotten to the bottom of what happened all those years ago.”

She considered testing for a GED, but her dream was to have the diploma she had worked for –and her parents had paid for – 13 years earlier. So after Bridget had raised her two stepchildren and established herself as an electrical contractor in her father’s company, she decided to visit the school’s current principal and find out what was missing. The school determined that she had met all the state’s requirements for graduation and could just request a diploma or she could take a half-credit of World Religions to complete all of the private school’s additional requirements.

Bridget enrolled in a World Religions course with Village Virtual and completed it with a 95.67%. “The lady at the Department of Education said she had worked there for 20 years,” said Bridget, “and had never heard of a school doing anything like that for anyone before.

Many people were surprised by my decision to go back after so long a time and try to earn my high school diploma,” she continued, “but all were supportive. Whenever I saw my stepchildren fixing to make a bad decision about school, I would say, ‘Do you want to be like me and not have a diploma?’”

Bridget can say that no longer! She is an exemplary role model and an inspiration for all of us who may have an old dusty dream that needs to be polished up and pursued.