Alexander High School senior Christopher Morgan is known as one of the country's top braille readers — he recently competed at the international Braille Challenge Finals in Los Angeles for the ninth time, finishing third in the varsity division.
He's also the youngest player on the Goalball Adult Elite Team for Atlanta.
But even with all of his accolades and the recognition that comes with being a standout academically and as a student-athlete, it was a simple, generous act of kindness by a classmate he had never met that made a lasting impression on Morgan.
While he was walking between classes on the second day of school, junior Victoria Vela accidentally tripped and broke Morgan’s walking cane, which is a critical mobility aid.
Vela immediately apologized. When she got home, she said she told her parents, and decided she should buy him a new cane. A few days later, she found Morgan in the hallway and gave him the new cane.
Morgan said he’s had several canes broken by fellow students over the past four years, including five or six in his first semester alone. Some students have broken his canes on purpose, he said.
None had ever replaced his cane, which is why Vela’s generous act stood out.
“You know, I don't hold that against people at all,” he said. “But the act of generosity was just so much for me, and it meant so much to me that I couldn't just let it go unnoticed.”
Beyond the act of kindness, Morgan has bigger ambitions ahead. He will graduate from AHS in December, a semester early.
He's also pursuing goalball, a Paralympic sport where blind and visually impaired athletes throw a ball with bells embedded into their opponents' net. He led the Atlanta Elite Team in scoring at a recent national tournament in Colorado Springs and hopes to make the U.S. National Team.
He hasn't decided on a college yet, but said he may first attend a special independent living training center in Colorado for blind individuals.
As for Vela, Morgan said he hopes they can remain friends.
“I look for quality over quantity, and someone who does stuff like that is quality,” he said. “So definitely, absolutely would love to be friends.”
