Valencia grad, NFL player attributes academics to his success

Source: signalscv.com --- Friday, June 30, 2017
On the first day of the 2017 NFL Draft, Valencia grad Tedric Thompson was gathered with family, friends, former coaches and his high school academic counselor, Theresa Long. “She’s the one who really deserves this credit,” Thompson said Sunday at the Vereen Playmakers Football Camp at Valencia High. “Because I used to struggle in school, and she was always on my side. She really deserves the credit.” When he got the call that he was drafted to the Seattle Seahawks in the fourth round, Thompson cried. Long cried harder. “I said, ‘It happened. This is what we’ve been working so hard for. And it happened,’” Long said. “It wasn’t all in vain. This hard work for the past six years. It was a really good feeling.” MORE: Football and fun at 4th annual Vereen Playmakers Football Camp When Long met Thompson, she says his academic future was questionable. But she saw “something very special” in him and worked with Laura Lorenze, of Valencia Tutors Learning Center, to get him back on track academically. Thompson took extra classes during the day and in the evening, with Long by his side for encouragement. “That tenacity he showed on the football field, he put into his academics and he pulled it off,” Long said. When he got to the University of Colorado, Thompson texted Long grade-by-grade updates on how he was doing in his classes. He invited her and her husband to watch him play football and visited with her at the tailgate parties afterwa ...

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