Alex Wladich just joined the Scholastic Corporate Communications team, but she didn’t travel far to get here – she came from the Scholastic Education group! Here’s her first OOM post, in which she shares an interesting story about signs, fate, and the real-life ways that Scholastic products are helping change kids’ lives.

A few weeks ago, 800 people – teachers, administrators, and Scholastic employees – gathered in Florida for the READ 180 National Summer Institute. While there, they ran into an unexpected guest – someone who perfectly encapsulated why READ 180, a reading intervention program for struggling readers, is so important.

“Do you believe in signs?” asked Mary Mitchell, Senior Vice President of Marketing for Scholastic Education, asked. “I do.” Then she welcomed a young woman named Elena to the stage – a surprise real-life success story, whose experience with READ 180 changed her life.

Elena has been going about her day at work in the hotel conference center deli. But then she began making conversation with some conference attendees, and asked them what it was all about.

No one expected Elena’s response when she learned what the conference was for:

“Oh, I was in READ 180 in middle school…it changed my life!”

Elena, like many students, once struggled with reading, but thanks to READ 180, her reading has greatly improved – and she’s even in college studying medical administration. These kinds of stories can be found everywhere, but it was especially exciting to find one literally the day before Mary was about to deliver her conference address. So she threw out her script and brought Elena on stage. And her Success Story is just one of many.

Whether you believe in signs or not, there is no denying Elena is a true example of what educators around the world dedicate their lives to. And the tearful standing ovation the audience gave her made that apparent.

Check out the video here.