Mr. Alton Williams was born on January 8th, 1986 to Mr. Alton Williams Sr. and Ms. Pricilla Bennett. Alton was born and raised in Philadelphia. Growing up he resided in the Strawberry Mansion section of North Philadelphia. He has a sister, Medina, who is five years older than him. Alton and Medina were close growing up and remain close to this current day. They have remained in daily contact since he has been incarcerated and Medina has went to visit him on numerous occasions.
Alton was raised in loving and nourishing environment. Both he and his sister were raised together by their parents in a stable household. Alton’s father worked as a cab driver and his mother worked as a school teacher. All his basic necessities were met, and
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He enjoyed going to school and history was his favorite subject. Learning about historical events always caught his attention. However, during his early developmental years, he struggled in school. Records obtained from the School District of Philadelphia reveled that an Individualized Educational Plan (IEP) was formulated for Alton when he was in the first grade. Despite his early academic struggles, by the time the third grade school year ended school Alton had made tremendous progress. Medina recalled Alton has “an average kid in school and stated, he wasn’t a scholar, but he did his work and he liked going to school.” Complimentary comments from his teachers about his hard work and improved effort are reflective of the satisfactory grades he then began to receive. In contrast, the progress notes also foreshadowed an area of Alton’s that he still continues to struggle with. Concern surrounding his socialization skills, his teachers highlighted an area that he needed to improve on. Unfortunately, no significant improvement in this area was ever made as this was evident in my interviews with Alton. Communication and the expression of his feelings are issues that continue to plaque him. To this present day, expressing himself is an uncomfortable task for him to overcome.
The IEP formulated for Alton would follow him to the sixth grade. The implementation of the IEP would be instrumental in improving Alton’s academic future. Each year he continued to progress and at end of his 8th grade school year he was awarded a scholarship to attend Cardinal Dougherty High School. This would be the commencement of most successful time period of his life. As Alton described to me, this was a “hectic” period of his life and it made him nervous but he would