GCU TODAY • 1 3
off-the-cuff speaker. She double-majored at GCU in Christian studies and
criminal justice, then moved to Fort Worth to earn a master’s in education.
She planned to come home in three years. She never did.
Sydney directed choirs and sang solos at Wedgwood Baptist, and she was a
champion for students at Fort Worth’s Success High, one last opportunity for
many troubled teens.
“Sydney’s students asked her one day if she would take a bullet for them,”
Don Browning recalls. “And she was so funny and sly, she said, `Yes, because,
first of all, I know howmany of you would never get around to getting life
insurance, and secondly, I know where I’m going when I die.’”
***
Jessica Reyes came to GCU with so many dual-enrollment credits that she
probably could have finished college in two years. Instead, she took three,
thriving in her small classes, tackling organic chemistry and earning her
biology degree last spring.
Reyes, 22, is working to save money for medical school and hopes to
become a pediatrician who helps families without basic health care. Like
Sydney, she wants to leave her mark on the world.
“This was such a huge blessing. I feel that something good came of
something bad.”
***
By the time she graduated from high school, ElizabethMacias had lost touch
with GCU and had no money to go to college. Her sister-in-law, Nicole (Foley)
Macias, a GCU alumna, brought Elizabeth to campus and introduced her to
Jennifer Flores, an admissions counselor. The scholarship offer, Flores said,
was still good.
As a GCU student, Elizabeth, 21, put a lot of pressure on herself, fearful
of failing the Brownings. She hopes to use her degree in psychology to help
troubled teens and families.
“I honestly don’t know what I would have done without the promise that
was made to me. And I felt I owed it to Sydney Browning to be here and do
well. I think she would be very proud of what’s becoming of that promise.”
***
In August, Ada Ortega will move to California to start her doctoral program
in pharmacy at Loma Linda University.
“I feel like God had a plan for me,” she says. “I had to follow the path to get
here, but He pretty much set it up for me.”
While at GCU, Ortega, 22, held down two jobs, played intramural football
and worked hard to earn a biology degree. She recognized the gravity of her
good fortune and wanted to make it count. She hopes the Brownings feel a
blessing has come from their tragic loss.
“Sydney was always helping other kids, and that’s why they did this for us.
If she had had that chance to be here, she would have done the same.”
***
ChristianMorales might have gone to community college without the GCU
scholarship. But GCU was perfect for him. After changing his major several
times as a freshman, Morales, 21, settled on sociology, and wants to be a
social worker or counselor. “I don’t want to do just one thing in my life,” he
says. “I want to do many things.”
When Morales started at GCU, he created a bucket list of
accomplishments by the time he’s 30: Get a college degree. Visit Japan. Work
in an underdeveloped country. And he made a promise to Sydney Browning.
“I want to return the favor. Even if I couldn’t pay someone’s full
tuition, maybe I could buy someone’s books or create a ‘Tribute to Sydney’
scholarship.”
***
The week’s graduation of Sydney’s Kids fulfills the original promise made
nearly 14 years ago and brings a sense of resurrection to Stafford.
“Sydney’s life was taken out of the world, but her influence and legacy
has had a lasting value among the children she taught,” Stafford says.
“And her name has a lasting legacy at GCU among the 18 who came
and the five who graduated. They will have an exponential effect on the
world because of her life.”
Sydney Browning’s parents, Diana and Don, pictured with Sydney’s Kids,
believe their daughter, a GCU alumna, would be pleased the five were able
to attend GCU because of a promise that came after her death in 1999.
Sydney’s Kids (from left) Sarai Piña, ElizabethMacias, Ada Ortega
(holding a portrait of Sydney Browning), ChristianMorales and Jessica
Reyes sit tall in their second-grade classroom at Granada Primary
School in Phoenix.
photos by darryl webb
