What does a high school student need to take their GPA and life to the next level? Virgil C. Revish, an author, consultant, motivational speaker, and mentor, needs a plan, a program, or a manual, whatever it is called, to take constructive steps to achieve their academic and life goals. He lays the steps out in his book VISION: Going To The Next Level (ReadersMagnet; 2021).
Revish recently appeared as a guest in Emmy Award-winning journalist Kate Delaney’s radio program America Tonight.
How one father inspired his son’s advocacy
“We had a great off-air conversation. You were just telling me about how you wanted to help young people. How did you get the love of wanting to do that and take it to so many different levels?” asked Delaney.
“When I was growing up, my father was an advocate of education,” said Revish. “When my friend used to come around, he used to talk to us about education, everyday life, how to take care of yourself when you’re growing up, what crowd to mingle with, moving on from negativity. Those kinds of things were instilled in me.
“I have a father and mother at home. I was blessed because, during that time, a lot of kids didn’t have both parents at home. I had a roof over my head. I had clothes on my back. I never had to work for food or anything like that. So, what my father did is he instilled a lot of things in me. You know? My father had a fifth-grade education, but he sent all seven of us to college. He worked for civil service.
“We never had to want anything. During that time, it was hard times, but it didn’t look like hard times during that time because we never had to want anything. We were struggling just like everybody else.”
What “Vision” is all about?
“Your book is really like a manual,” said Delaney, “a manual to show there are options and opportunities and help the reader through a plan-kind of program.”
“The manual,” said Revish, “was about this young man in high school, and I knew his father. He’s a good athlete, and he participated in football. But after three days of practice, the coach came and told him he wasn’t eligible, the reason being he didn’t have the GPA. He was two grades behind on his core classes also, so that made him ineligible.
“What I did is I got with him and his father. I said, ‘What we need to do is we need to put a plan together for him. Keep that plan together, and then the next following year, he can start applying what he has put in his plan.’
“We put in the plan a lot of things what he had to do. He had to do a lot of things. It’s harder for him to increase on his own. He improved his overall academic performance. He improved his GPA. He changed his study habits. He also worked consistently with a tutor in the area in which he also had problems.
“Anyone could go through this program just like a road map. I can work with you. I can get your kid to the next level. The only thing you have to do is you have to prepare yourself. Any kid, any parent that wants to work with me, I’m there for them.”
Working with kids and families
“Some families you can work with,” said Revish. “You’ll not get a hundred percent. But if I see a kid that has some potential, I will work with them because I see he has potential, but he just doesn’t have the support. This kid will receive the scholarship from this program. That’s what I did. I was his mentor for him and his dad, for his parents. I just showed him the road map. What he did is he changed some of his study habits, some of the people whom he was hanging around with.”
Habits of successful students
“First thing you have to do is you have to be a forward thinker. The second thing you have to do is you have to study. The third thing you have to do is have a firm resolution. The fourth thing you have to do is settle a schedule and always know how to ask questions for help. The last thing is you have to stay fit, physically and mentally. Those ideas carry a long way in life. I just have these things to share with the parents and students.”
A child’s future starts in middle school
“My main projection is the middle school because they (the middle school pupils) are our future. We have to get them situated and have them focus on what they have to go in life because once they leave middle school, that’s when life begins for them. We have to prepare them for what they need to do. We have to put a plan in place for them, and they have to work it.”
Purchase Virgil C. Revish’s book VISION: Going To The Next Level today on https://virgilrevish.com/