Jada-Symone Batichon has kept her grade-point average at 4.0 since she began high school. She is now celebrating receiving almost $1.8 million in scholarships and 53 out of 58 college acceptances.
The 18-year-old Powder Springs native told People, “All of it paid off. It’s everything I have worked hard for.”
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According to Batichon, her parents’ experience as the first to attend college constantly encouraged her.
Throughout high school at Wheeler, Batichon was involved in a lot of extracurricular activities, such as cheerleading, student government, and even working as a lunchroom monitor at an elementary school. She also founded a group at Wheeler called EmpowHer and was a member of the National Honor Society.
She also dual-enrolled at Kennesaw State University, where she recently completed a college-level psychology course with an A.
She applied to so many schools in pursuit of scholarship offers, saying, “I didn’t want to go into debt. My mom told me interest rates are high. A lot of people are stuck paying loans, and she is still paying hers. … I wanted the upper hand in that — my choice.”
Dr. Claudia Batichon, Batichon’s mother, is a 39-year-old professional, technical, and agricultural education teacher at Wheeler High School, where the teen recently graduated. Dr. Claudia Batichon had a significant role in her daughter’s success. Her independent educational consulting business, THINK Protégé, focuses on preparing students for college and the workforce.
Dr. Claudia Batichon is among the first members of their Haitian family to complete high school in the United States. One of her responsibilities at THINK is to help her pupils secure scholarships.
“Even though I’m a daughter, I’m a client,” Batichon remarked.
When it came to her daughter, Dr. Claudia Batichon told People, “I was like, ‘I am going to treat you just like I do with all of my other kids that I work with.’ I just felt like we needed structure. This whole college process is overwhelming. And if she had that structure, it would be easy for her to navigate the process.”
According to her mother, Batichon completed six high school courses during her middle school years.
“She was basically done with a semester-and-a-half of high school while she was in middle school,” Dr. Claudia Batichon recounted. “By the time she got to junior year [at Wheeler], her guidance counselor was like, ‘There’s nothing else left here for her to take.’”
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Batichon was certified as a nursing assistant after completing coursework at Chattahoochee Technical College and KSU. Although she had the option to graduate from high school sooner, Dr. Claudia Batichon wanted to ensure that the teenager still got the experience of being a typical high school student.
“I want her to go to prom,” Dr. Claudia Batichon said. “I want her to still be a cheerleader. I want her to still play softball … By the time she became a senior, she had so much room [in her schedule]. I was like ‘You can work and you can do work-based learning.’ “
Batichon had no trouble selecting one of her 53 college selections. She decided on the University of Alabama, which she had visited as early as ninth grade.
“Roll tide,” she declared.
She intends to get a bachelor’s and master’s degree in business management in four years.
Her mother hopes that her four brothers will follow in her footsteps. “You know how they always say, ‘You’re supposed to leave it better than you found it’? I felt like with me doing what I did, now she’s able to do it. And my hope is her children will be able to do even better,” she said.
Ahead of moving to Alabama, Batichon is actively seeking an internship or job this summer.
“I will definitely miss my parents, especially my mom,” she said about leaving for college. “I feel like it’ll be so quiet. I’m used to living in a busy household, I probably will get homesick.”
“But I know how to manage my stuff,” she said. “I think it won’t be that hard.”
