Woman graduates from nursing school established by her mother

This past May, Shaquita Bandy graduated from nursing school at St. Andrews University’s. Of course, Bandy’s mother, Dorothy Miller was proud of her daughter’s accomplishment, but it was a moment of personal pride too. After all, she’d helped launch the nursing school at St. Andrews — and now her daughter was in the school’s first graduating class.

It wasn’t a scenario that many would have predicted when Miller gave birth to her daughter at the age of 15.

“We came from a lower socioeconomic background,” Miller told WRAL. “When I got pregnant, I was in ninth grade.”

To provide her daughter, Shaquita Bandy, with the best possible future, Miller joined the military. She later attended nursing school and earned a bachelor of science in nursing. She followed that with multiple masters degrees and eventually a PhD. In 2021, Miller — that’s Dr. Miller, actually — helped establish St. Andrews’ new school of nursing.

“She gave me everything I needed to make sure I’m successful,” Bandy told WRAL. “You can imagine the pressure, though, coming through a program that was just established by your mother, being the first one to graduate, trying to make sure that you keep the program going … it’s tremendous pressure, but they say pressure makes diamonds.”

“I had a wonderful mother when I was going through all that at 15,” Miller said. “Her goal for me was to not stop school. I had my child on a Friday, and my mother made sure I was in school that next Monday.”