In the school year of 2012, Chy Johnson was being bullied. Students were throwing trash at her, pushing her around in the halls and calling her names, such as “stupid.” Chy suffered from a birth defect that only allowed her brain to function at a third-grade level. Despite the defect, Chy knew the actions of her peers were hateful. Chy, a usually cheerful sophmore, came home every night at the beginning of the school year crying. Her mother, Liz Johnson, said “that permanent smile she had, that gleam in her eye, that was all gone.” Talking with administrators and teachers did not help. But talking with the quaterback of the football team did.
Carson Jones,a senior at the Queen Creek, Arizona high school, took Chy under his wing. Liz Johnson went to him with high hopes because he escorted her to the Special Olympics. Liz asked that he keeps Carson keeps his ears open and look out for who may be bullying Chy. However, Carson took matters into his own hands. Instead of tattling on other kids in the school, he took someone in.
“Telling on kids would’ve just cause more problems,” Carson said. So instead, he asked Chy to eat lunch with him and his teammates. “I just thought that if they saw her with us every day, maybe they’d start treating her better.” It all got better for Chy from there. Tucker Workman, the starting running back of the football team, made sure that someone walked with Chy between every class. During class, cornerback Colton Moore made sure that Chy sat in the row right behind the team. No matter where she went, she had the football team protecting her back. These football players are preventing bullying with simply showing love.
This changed Chy. After a few weeks of “her boys” protecting her, she started coming home bubbly again. These boys made Chy’s sophomore year unforgettable. With not knowing how far Miss Johnson will go in life, it is important to make each day count, and Carson has made her high school experience count.
Sources: 1.http://espn.go.com/espn/story/_/id/8579599/chy-johnson-boys