Michael Andrews excels at Freeman

When 14-year-old Michael Andrews visited his new school with his new parents in 2010, he was wary. At his last school, in Lishui, China – a “city school” that was tough for an orphanage kid – he got in fights and quit going reliably, setting out on his own every morning rather than sitting in class.

Maybe he’d stick around at school, he told his parents, or maybe he wouldn’t.

They laughed. It was Freeman Middle School, in Valleyford, a rural community southeast of Spokane with 2,500 people. Where would he go? As it turned out, it wasn’t an issue.

“We laugh about it now, because Michael is such a great kid and gets along with so many different people,” said Megan Andrews, who adopted him with her husband, Jim, when Michael was just shy of 14.

And the students and educators at Freeman embraced him, launching fast friendships and providing the extra help he needed at school. They would help ensure that a boy who spoke no English, a sudden eighth-grader who’d left China as a sixth-grader, would not only graduate but excel.

Andrews, who turned 19 in May, will head next fall to Northwest Christian University in Eugene, Oregon, with a track scholarship he netted as a pole-vaulter. He also has academic and leadership scholarships, his mother said.

“Michael is actually incredibly smart,” Megan Andrews said. “It didn’t take us long to realize he had a great mind and that he just needed encouragement and opportunity.”

First, he had to learn English. A tutor who spoke Mandarin taught him the basics before he started with another, who didn’t speak Mandarin. Then his mother taught him English at home every morning of his freshman and sophomore years, from 7 to 9 a.m., before he went to school for his other subjects.

His teachers worked with him before and after school. They tested him one-on-one, sometimes verbally quizzing him on material rather than giving him written assessments – listening and talking are easier than reading and writing when you’re learning the language.

And staff at the school adjusted his schedule – he’s taking freshman English as a senior, for example – so he could meet graduation requirements but also keep up in his classes.

Sports translated more easily than academics. Megan and Jim Andrews knew even before adopting Michael that he loved to play, and he became a three-sport athlete for Freeman, also playing football – he was a starter on special teams and backup running back his junior and senior years – and wrestling. He said he looked forward to graduation with excitement and dread.

“I want to graduate, but all my friends, they’re going to go in all different directions,” he said. “You just start over.”

He’s done it before, his mother pointed out.

“For Michael, even though (college will be) eight hours away, that transition and change is going to be so much easier than what he already did,” Megan Andrews said. “For most kids, their hardest time is going away to college. Michael’s already done his biggest change he’ll ever make.”