WASHINGTON COUNTY, Md. (DC News Now) — According to Washington County Public Schools, about 700 students are currently experiencing homelessness.

Alyssa Miller was experiencing homelessness while she was at Boonsboro High School, which impacted her focus on school and attendance.

“I kind of acted out a lot,” Miller said. “I was always in the principal’s office or with guidance counselors and I didn’t have a lot of motivation because there wasn’t anyone like making me go to school, checking my grades.”

During that time she found it difficult to believe in herself until teachers and staff took her under their wing.

“I just saw a lot of people believed in me,” Miller explained. “When someone would try to help, I would tell them, I’m not a charity case and I don’t need anyone’s help, but they said I’m an investment that they’re putting time and effort into me because they see my drive.”

That drive, and mentorship, led Miller to become a reading apprentice and then a paraprofessional at Emma K Doub Elementary School.

“She just has this natural ability to build a relationship with a track child and to identify with them and obviously, that’s a lot because her background emulates a lot of the same backgrounds of our students,” the principal of Emma K Doub Elementary School, Stacy Henson, said.

Miller said she is teaching her students things that they might not be learning at home.

“Just trying to push them, trying to give them something to look forward to, rewarding them for their good behaviors,” Miller explained.

Now that she is on the path to becoming an educator herself, she hopes she will be someone’s motivation who may be in her shoes.

“Resources help you so much,” Miller said. “You can be an investment, don’t make yourself a charity case.”