A New Era

Day 142

My husband and I have been blessed with 2 boys who’ve always been respectful and good hearted. They followed the rules and rarely needed to be disciplined. Still, parenting can be a nerve-wracking experience.

I have an earlier post “bragging” about our youngest son Derek, who will graduate this year with a degree in cyber-security and enter the Army as an officer.  Today I want to pay tribute to his brother Dylan. If you’re lucky as parents, you walk into a new season where you know your kids are on the right track and on their way into true adulthood. Dylan’s recent accomplishments have put him onto a promising path that has propelled us into that glorious season of life.

Dylan graduated from UCF in Orlando just over a year ago, with a degree in Criminal Justice. He got a job fairly quickly, working in a juvenile detention center. The position did not require a college degree, and within a very short period of time he grew to dislike it for many reasons. He began an intense search, specifically seeking employment as a Probation Officer for the state of Florida. As you can imagine, the number of openings as compared to a position within the public sector was very small. The competition was fierce.

On our end, all we could do was pray and trust that God had a perfect plan for our boy. Dylan never lost faith and in July was offered an adult Probation Officer job in Daytona, half an hour from his home. He was required to spend 3 months at the State of Florida Law Enforcement Academy and pass every test with a minimum score of 80, then pass the State Certification exam.

This training was by far the most grueling Dylan has ever experienced. He got to work with incredible determination, spending his nights and much of his weekend time studying. In the middle of it all, Hurricane Irma hit and a State of Emergency was declared. The class missed 8 full days – 64 hours of training that had to be completed prior to the scheduled graduation date. Evening and Saturday classes were added, accelerating the amount of work and decreasing the amount of available study time.

Despite the heightened level of difficulty and stress, I’m proud to report that Dylan passed every test on the first attempt with a score of at least 90, and was the first in his class to complete the certification test, with a score of 91. On Friday he became a certified Probation Officer for the state of Florida.

Just as we had suspected, God’s plan for our son was, and is, perfect. Dylan has always had a huge heart and a desire to help others. He’s always had a keen sense of appreciation for life and an understanding of who he is. He has an inner strength that will lend the balance that is much needed in the law enforcement field; a genuine caring for others combined with the ability to be tough when necessary. I congratulate him on a job well done, and am thankful that he’s on his way.

And we can truly say that we’ve done everything in our power to help our children grow into self-sufficient, amazing adults.