“I respect these children so much,” Willard principal Diana Garcia said. “They walk through what they have to walk through. Some of them don’t have basic needs. But they show up.”
But Garcia often says she “comes from poverty, not dysfunction.” Despite her parents’ lack of material means, there was abundant love at home, thrift store books — including a set of encyclopedias that had some volumes missing — and the pervasive sense that education would vault their bright daughter to a better life.lived up to her parents’ dreams for her.
“I can relate to a lot of our kids,” said Garcia. “I’ve walked the streets that they’ve walked through to get to school. My message has always been, ‘Your current situation does not dictate your future. If I did it, you can do it.” Garcia never looked back. She landed at the now-closed Ferguson Elementary at Seventh and Norris, and has worked in education in North Philadelphia ever since — as a teacher and principal at district and charter schools.