Faith guides grad through tragedy

Josh Cutler has a reputation for reaching out.

"He's a servant through and through," said Donna Corder, a family consumer science and speech teacher at Bushland High School who also is the technical education coordinator. "He's one of the few kids that kids and adults respect."

But Cutler has struggled.

"He had no motivation whatsoever," Corder said. "We thought we were going to lose him four years ago."

Cutler faced several challenges after he moved to Tascosa Hills from Fort Worth while in the eighth grade.

"My mom passed away in my ninth-grade year," he said. "That was pretty difficult, just starting high school."

But he straightened his path, working on academics and sports like football.

"I'm not the biggest guy on the team," Cutler said. "And this year I really got into economics, like stocks and stuff like that."

And being a mentor comes easily to him.

"I love to do that with my buddies and especially underclassmen," Cutler said. "Some people come up and talk about what's going on in their lives, and I don't even know them. That's cool."

Cutler will graduate from Bushland with plans to master some of the basic courses at Amarillo College before moving to West Texas A&M University to study the real estate business.

Faith has helped the graduate move his life along.

"He's a very, very strong Christian," Corder said. "I think that's an important part of his change of philosophy. He's shown Christ to several students through his actions."

Cutler himself credits his faith and his experiences in the youth group at The Church at Quail Creek for some of his success.

"I'm very strong in my faith," he said. "You can definitely use that as a teaching tool, and I know that it helped me personally."

Editor's note: The Amarillo Globe-News is profiling a student a day from May 9 through Friday as part of its 2008 graduation coverage. Students were nominated by Globe-News readers.