Nicole-Raye Ellis admits that as a freshman in high school she was angry and had an attitude problem.
“I was out of control,” she said.
But following a tragedy as a sophomore, she turned her life around. Ellis graduated as an honor roll student at Gorham High School and she wants to earn a nursing degree so she can help others.
She credits Assistant Principal Saundra Gnidziejko with being instrumental in getting on the right path for life. “She is the best woman alive. If it wasn’t for her, I would never have made it through the past four years,” Ellis said Monday.
In her first year of high school, Ellis had problems. “I was mouthy, defiant,” she said.
But she said Gnidziejko had faith in her and encouraged her. “She never judged me. She always stuck by me, stayed by my side,” Ellis said.
Gnidziejko was proud when Ellis walked across the stage Sunday to receive her diploma. “She’s a young woman with an awful lot of courage and strength,” said the assistant principal.
During middle school and in early high school years, Ellis thought teachers were out to get her. “Looking back, it’s not like that at all,” she said.
Ellis said in her sophomore year she had begun to learn more self-control. But while skipping school one day, tragedy struck. She was riding in a jeep on a trail with four other students when an accident occurred, killing the driver, Christopher LaCharite, when the Jeep struck a tree. “He was only 16,” she said.
She and three others were left unconscious. She doesn’t remember the accident. “I woke up walking down the trail,” she said.
In the hospital, her mom, Jeanine Mitchell, told her the driver died. “I didn’t believe her,” Ellis said.
But her bed was surrounded by people crying. “To be here one day and gone the next shocks you,” she said. “How fast a life can go.”
The accident seemed to be a turning point in her life. “After the accident, I rarely got in trouble,” she said.
She focused on improving her grades in Gorham and studied fashion merchandising at Portland Area Technical High School.
As a junior, she joined a marketing association and took first place in a state entrepreneurship event. She went to national competition in California.
She made a solo presentation for the judges, gaining confidence in her abilities. “Anything I want to do, I can do it,” she realized.
Ellis plans to relocate to California where she has been accepted at Concord College but will go to San Diego City College. Her goal is to transfer to San Diego State after establishing residency in California. “I worked so hard, and it finally paid off,” she said after graduation.
But she said the work didn’t represent the biggest challenge. “Finding out who I am and what I wanted to do the rest of my life,” she said was the most difficult.
She said Scott Caulfield, a history teacher, helped her view the whole world. “It’s not that great a place and I need to do something to make it better,” she said. “We’re the next generation, we have to get up and make a difference.”
After earning a degree, she wants to backpack through Europe, visit Africa, and maybe join the Peace Corps.
She said nursing would guarantee her a job helping people every day. “I knew I couldn’t just go to work to make money,” she said.
Gnidziejko said Ellis is a compassionate individual with a lot of perseverance. “I think she knows how much hard work it takes to overcome difficulties. That combined with her caring nature, I think she’ll be very successful in nursing,” Gnidziejko said.
Ellis appreciates her mom, who works in the Gorham Post Office. “We’re more like sisters,” she said.
She praised her mother who has worked hard as a single parent to provide for her and her brother, Patrick Smith, who will be a freshman in the fall. “I didn’t treat her as good as I should have,” Ellis said. “I’ve caused her so much anxiety.”
Ellis has a job as a sales rep in Scarborough this summer to earn money for college. Reflecting on her school years, she said God helped her and she feels inspired by God to help others.
“If I do good and help people along the way, it’ll all come back around,” she said. “It’s good Karma.”
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