Six years after being shot four times, Excel grad aims to start own school

In the spring of 2014, Raynard Gillispie went on a school trip to Baltimore and Washington, D.C. It was the first time the Englewood native had ever left Chicago.

"I'm so used to just seeing the same thing. It changed my mind, just showed me that the world is much bigger, and there is more opportunities than what I see," Gillispie told ABC 7.

Gillispie said the trip was one of many opportunities he'd been given after deciding to enroll Excel Academy of Englewood. Excel is an accelerated school in the Chicago Public Schools district for students 16-21 years old that are behind in their studies.

He had a long road to get to Excel. He had gotten caught up in gang violence, and at the age of 16 he was shot four times. He couldn't come to school while he was recovering, and by the end of the year, he realized he would be failing ninth grade.

"I was too old to be a freshman. That got to me, and I let it get to me," he said. "[So] I stayed out of school for three years, going on four."

The longer Gillispie stayed out of school, the more he realized that his life was not going in the direction he wanted.

"I didn't want to go to jail or be somebody that was on a T-shirt, that got killed," he said. "I had to make a change."

When Gillispie heard about Excel, he knew it was where he needed to be. One of the things that set Excel apart was a program called Group Guided Interaction. During this, the students could talk openly about the issues they were facing, which for Gillispie and others included gang violence.

"At the end of GGI, we'd be all like family," he said. "We won't see each other as the opposition, or different."

At Excel, Gillispie quickly blossomed from a quiet student who kept to himself to someone who made a real impact, said the school's executive director, Kevin Sweetland. Gillispie was recommended for the district's Student Advisory Council, where he worked to raise awareness about the violence that students like him face.

Gillispie is in the back left of this group photo.

"He's just a very impressive young man," Sweetland said. "He knows what he wants, and he was looking for that environment to help him succeed and reach his goals."

And since graduating, his goal has been to live out the lessons that Excel taught him. Gillispie was chosen for I.C. Stars, a competitive internship program during which he's learning computer skills and networking.

He hopes to use those lessons to give back to the alternative education community in Chicago. He is working to start his own school to help people of all ages go back and finish their studies.

"I'm now partnering with different organizations and talking to them, and turning my thought into actual reality," Gillispie said.

He plans to call his school Second Wind, and he hopes it will inspire people who are struggling to find their way just as he once was.

"What I learned at Excel, is that giving back is the biggest thing," he said. "That's the biggest thing I want to leave behind, that I changed lives, and I let people know that it is a second chance."

This post is sponsored by Camelot Education. Camelot is an education company that partners with Chicago Public Schools. Excel Academy of Engelwood is one of 39 of Camelot's alternative schools around the country, six of which are in Chicago.