Kent Miles

The Salt Lake Community High School is a remarkable place. It is a school where students learn to succeed. That in itself is a wonderful thing, but many schools teach students to succeed. What is remarkable here is that the faculty and staff are committed to the success of a student body that many have consigned to failure. It is a school that is largely ignored by the public, an easy target for legislative budget cuts. It is easy to make decisions that affect the future of people we do not know. It is easy to ignore those who are not conventional high school students: adults returning to get their diplomas, immigrants new to this land and just learning English, teen moth￾ers, gang members, kids who have dropped out of school and have the courage to come back, students who function better with more personal attention to their scholastic needs than is available in regular high schools, youth and adults who are homeless… In the spring of 1994 I began to photograph some of the students at SLCHS. I wanted to show the general public the reality of these people who are fighting to own a piece of the American Dream. These are people who want the same things I want and are willing to work for it in spite of difficulties I cannot imagine. An exhibit was created combining the photo￾graphic portraits with personal handwritten statements from each student photographed for the show. Presenting the combination of internal and external realities caused me, at least , to change the way I look at people. I am less judgmental now when I meet others, and I have learned there is much more connecting us to each other than could ever possibly separate us. I hope it is a lesson I will never forget. These few images are from “The Class of ’94: Portraits from Salt Lake Community High School.”