Celebrating the 4,000th graduate of the Youth Academy

Spokane teen Tristan Williams said he had pretty much given up on school. He wasn’t doing his homework. He was skipping school. He was making bad choices.

But, after five months at the Washington Youth ChalleNGe Academy in Bremerton, he’s back on track and is expected to graduate Ferris High School next year.

“I was behind by a good full year, and now I will be caught up,” the 17-year-old said. “I’m really proud of that.”

In June, Williams officially became the 4,000th graduate of the Washington Youth ChalleNGe Academy, a free, state-run life intervention-credit retrieval program which had its first class in 2009. Any eligible teen of Washington state lives in housing provided on campus in Bremerton and immerses themselves in a focused approach for getting back on track in school and better equipped for life.

“Being the 4,000th graduate — it feels like I am part of a story that is slowly being told,” Williams said. “And it’s awesome.”

Steve Wood, the operations officer at the Youth Academy, described Williams as a model cadet who serves as an example for his peers.

Director Amy Steinhilber said Williams embodies the values of the Youth Academy, always polite with strong ethics and he helps represent more of a focused outreach the Academy has been doing in Eastern Washington to make sure folks there know the program is statewide. Steinhilber says she would like to eventually see a new campus in Eastern Washington at some point.

In fact, Williams said he had talked to some of his Spokane peers about attending the Academy and its distance in Bremerton was an issue for some families.

“A lot of my friends I actually talked to about joining with me and their only reason for not doing so is because it was all the way out here in Bremerton,” Williams said. “And I think if it was over there they would have definitely joined. And it would have helped them out.”

Tristan is lifted up by some of his fellow Spartans at commencement.

Williams says he’ll miss the Academy. He was part of the Spartans platoon, which had its own dedicated bay on campus. Walking around his living space shortly before commencement, he says, “It’s fun at times and other times it gets stressful because we’re living with 44 other cadets for five months. It’s nice here. We’ve made memories here that we’re never going to forget. There’s been fun times, sad times, bad times. We’ll look back at them and laugh. This is a place that we’re going to remember and we’re going to miss.”

Tristan looks at the Vietnam War Memorial in Olympia during a field trip in June.

He says he got between 8 and 9 hours of sleep, “Two hours more than I probably would have gotten at home.”

Williams said his grades improved and his relationship with his family improved. He has five siblings and they wrote to him consistently while he was away.

His dad James said after commencement that he was missed immensely, “But we’re all super proud of Tristan getting through this.”

Tristan before commencement.

For anyone thinking of attending, Williams has this thought: “Push through. Don’t give up. It’s worth it. This academy is worth it. Every single second of it.”

Learn more at https://mil.wa.gov/youth-academy