Class President Beats Life’s Odds at Embry-Riddle
Twenty-two years ago, a newborn baby was abandoned in winter. First, she was known as Baby Doe. Then, she became Angel. Today, with love and support, she’s thriving and giving back to others what she’s been given.
Angel spent her first hours of life alone after being abandoned under an outdoor stairway at an apartment complex in Greensboro, North Carolina. Her biological mother, a child herself, hoped someone would find her and bring her in from the mid-November cold.
Luckily, a woman heard the baby whimpering as she was leaving for work at 5:45 a.m.
After being treated for hypothermia, Angel Thomas was fostered by a woman who later adopted her. It wasn’t until she was about 4 or 5 years old that Thomas learned she was adopted, and it wasn’t until she was in middle school, and the bullying started, that she began agonizing over the circumstances surrounding her adoption.
“I heard it all back then — like, ‘Your parents didn’t want you,’ or ‘You were a mistake,’” Thomas said. “All throughout that time, I just wondered: Why didn’t my biological mother want me?”
Her adoptive mother, Carrie Thomas, arranged for her to see a therapist, which Thomas says was crucial to her getting through that phase of her life.
“If I didn’t go through that therapy, I’m not sure I’d be here,” she said.
As a teenager, she leapt into leadership and service, from participating in youth mentorship and leadership organizations to joining a young pilots club, the Civil Air Patrol and two robotics teams. In 2018, she won Miss Teen Greensboro and was first runner-up in Miss Teen North Carolina. At Embry-Riddle, she volunteered with the Organization of Black Aerospace Professionals, making food baskets around the holidays, and participated in professional development through the Student Leadership Summit and Women in Aviation panels.
This spring, Thomas (’22) was president of her graduating class at Embry-Riddle, earning a bachelor’s degree in Aeronautics, with minors in business and occupational safety.
In Thomas’ freshman year at Embry-Riddle, she received the Praise! Scholarship, an endowed scholarship established by Embry-Riddle Controller Jaré Allocco Allen. The scholarship has been awarded six times to women and underrepresented students at Prescott and Daytona Beach campuses. Thomas said the scholarship helped pay for books, allowing her to spend fewer hours working and more time studying.
Scholarship assistance helped her, and she knows it helps other students. “When you invest in student scholarships, it goes beyond the classroom,” she said. “Scholarships honestly help alleviate many financial burdens students may face. No matter what the monetary value of the donation may be, donating helps the students accomplish their goals and focus on classes.”
She’s now working as a warehouse environmental health and safety specialist at Amazon in Indianapolis and continues to share her story to inspire others. She says she embraces her personal history, which contributes to where she is today and where she’s headed.
“I don’t think I would change a thing that’s happened in my life,” Thomas said, “because everything has just taught me that, no matter what, you have to keep moving forward. You have to stay positive and learn to love yourself no matter what your situation. Because it’s not where you’re coming from, it’s where you’re going to. At the end of the day, you have to keep moving forward.”