Dionne Thompson moved from Jamaica to Miami when she was 33 years old with her four children. She’s a single mom who drives trucks and cleans alleyways for the village of Miami Shores.
On May 23, her youngest daughter, Shakalah graduated from law school at Boston College after seven years on a full-ride scholarship.
“I’m a tough mama,” said Dionne. “I don’t cry. But on the 23rd, I did.”
Shakalah is proof that anything is possible. She arrived in the U.S. at 2 years old, and graduated from high school in North Miami Beach with scholarship offers totaling $1.7 million from 16 universities across the nation. She chose Boston College, where she flourished. Her journey exemplifies how higher education and community impact can serve as a chance to grow, lead and leave a mark on the world.
“From the time we were kids, it was clear that Shakalah carried a deep and unwavering desire to make the world a better place,” said her childhood friend, Marlika Marceau, a Yale graduate and World Bank Fellow. “Even with a full plate and a calendar packed with commitments, she never forgets the people she loves.”
Dionne worked as many as four jobs at the same time to support her children, including as a roofer, a nail technician, and a food caterer. In a few years, Dionne was able to buy a house.
Shakalah went to school and worked hard. While attending Dr. Michael M. Krop Senior High School, she balanced volunteering with multiple honor societies, worked full-time at Sicilian Oven in Aventura, and earned competitive grades in the gifted-honors program. She took dual enrollment classes at FIU, before transferring to Boston College, where she not only received a full ride, but also the Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Scholarship for demonstrating superior academic achievement and involvement with the African-American community.
“I was actually pre-med for the majority of my life,” said Shakalah. “I tunnel-visioned, kind of expecting myself to be a doctor, but then as I went through BC undergrad, things started to shift around.
In her sophomore year at Boston College, Shakalah co-founded an outreach organization for underrepresented students called The STEM and Health Outreach for AHANA (African, Hispanic, and Native American). It creates spaces for students to communicate, tutor one another, and learn from professionals.
She changed majors from biochemistry to sociology because she discovered that her natural talents included advocacy, speaking and persuasion.
“I wanted to become a lawyer because I realized that when it comes to work, you’re better off making your work align with your natural qualities,” she said. “That’s where you have the room to be creative and become an expert in what you do.”
This past March, she self-published her first book, “What the Dark Night Taught Me.” In this poetry collection that took a year and a half to create, she dove into her experiences with the dark night of the soul and existentialism.
“I want people to remember my essence and not just my accomplishments,” she said. “I need to give life to these things that I think are actually extensions of myself.”
Her mom, Dionne, was a home health aide for a family for 15 years and is now a certified truck driver in waste management in Miami Shores.
Dionne, Shakalah said, was strict growing up, but she is thankful for her mother’s overprotectiveness.
“She’s just had a very hard life and she’s had to learn a lot of things and has so much wisdom,” said Shakalah. “I think that she was very tough because when you’re doing it all by yourself, you have to be as extreme as you can be.”
Today, Shakalah is working on a second collection of poetry. After she graduated, she moved back to South Florida. She interned for two summers at law firms, and now she plans to practice commercial litigation.
Shakalah is excited to have her own place to call home after moving each year during her time at Boston College. In a few months, she will also have to pass the bar exam. Then, she will work as an attorney at a law firm.
“You get taught very early in physics that energy is neither created nor destroyed,” said Shakalah. “So know that if you’re putting energy into something, it has to amount to something. It has to go somewhere.”
As expected for a young adult and parent, Shakalah and her mother’s relationship has been challenging at times. But now it is strong and supportive.
“The best way I could describe my relationship with my mom is that when I was growing up, it was like forging steel, intense heat and resistance on both sides,” said Shakalah. “But in the end, it created something strong, enduring and sharp.”
This story is part of a collaboration between the Biscayne Times and the Lee Caplin School of Journalism and Media at Florida International University.