FORT WORTH, Texas – Teachers and parents have always said homework is important. And now one Fort Worth high school teacher is even more convinced of its importance.
Southwest High School freshmen biology teacher Lori Roque recently asked her students to research how certain diseases affect different organs of the body.
She was stunned by what she read in the outline of one of her students’ papers.
“I read it and went, ‘Oh my gosh! Wait a minute,’” she said. “Several of the symptoms that he had listed in his paper were symptoms that we had noticed in my daughter, Hope, but hadn’t really put two and two together.”
After reading Johnny Trinh’s paper, Roque took her 14-year-old daughter to the doctor. Hope was later rushed to the emergency room.
“They tested her blood sugar and it was 400. The normal is like 50 to 120. Ultimately, untreated that leads to coma and death,” she said.
Roque now gives credit to Trinh for prompting her to seek medical attention for her daughter. It may have saved her life.
“I feel really fortunate that Johnny turned it in on time and that I read it early,” she said. “What goes through my mind is, ‘Thank you, God! Thank you! Thank you that I did change that date, that I did tell them to do an outline and that he turned it in on time.’”
Trinh said he simply intended to research something that has afflicted his family.
“My father has it and all of my uncles have it,” he said. “It’s not like everyday that you see just because you did your homework you saved someone’s life.”
Roque confirmed that Trinh got an excellent score on the assignment.
“It’s kind of exciting when it gets to have some real life application, and what goes on in the classroom really has some connection outside the classroom,” she said.
