About National

Success Stories

Legal Eagle

Tiffany Guinn-Frith is one National College graduate who knows the value of an education. As a young girl, Tiffany’s father stressed to her the importance of continuing her education, and Tiffany made a promise to him she would become the first member of their family to earn a college degree. Tragically, her father would die in 1994 of acute lymphatic leukemia, when Tiffany was just 13. Handicapped by absences related to her father’s death, and with her desire to learn overshadowed by the confusion of a teenager struggling with grief and doubt, she dropped out of high school. Although she would later attempt to return, she did not graduate, and soon found herself married and struggling to help make ends meet in thankless jobs in factories and restaurants.

It was on lunch break from one such job that she saw a TV commercial for National College, and remembered her long-ago promise to her father. She knew what she must do. She went back to her old high school and within a week, had arranged to take her senior finals and obtained her high school diploma, then enrolled at National College’s Richmond Campus.

“I chose National College…because after the initial meeting with them, it was clear that they had a dedication to further education and achievement,” says Tiffany. “I knew it was the place for me.” Tiffany enrolled in the Business Administration - Management associate’s degree program, with a double major in Administrative Office Professional. Usually taking four classes per term, she completed her degree in August of 2005, and three days later began working as a legal secretary in a prestigious Richmond law firm.

Recently promoted to paralegal, Tiffany has fulfilled the promise she made long ago, and has been rewarded with the promise of a bright future. She looks forward to pursuing new heights in her education as well.