At the start of the school year, the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette profiled students who were facing new challenges and were off to "great beginnings." As the school year ends, some of them reflect on how the months have changed them and pushed them toward their goals.

Jacob Pasko, kindergartner

Robin Rombach, Post-Gazette Jacob Pasko, 6, has emerged with strong literacy and math skills and is a leader in his kindergarten class. "He's gotten the other kids to want to read like he does. Now he has a group of peers at his level," says his teacher, Kristine Conley. Click photo for larger image.

It's been a great year for Jacob Pasko.

In August, the 5-year-old was about to make the transition from the 4 Kids Early Learning Center in Braddock to public kindergarten at Wilkins Primary in the Woodland Hills School District. Now Jacob is 6 and champing at the bit to start first grade, not to mention Cub Scouts and baseball.

"Jacob came in with such strong emerging literacy skills, I had to do something to challenge him beyond what we normally do," said his teacher, Kristine Conley.

"I gave him more words to spell and more writing. He's working beyond grade level, writing beyond a typical kindergartner.

"He's also been a leader," she said. "He's gotten the other kids to want to read like he does. Now he has a group of peers at his level."

Jacob's mom, Leslie Pasko, of Turtle Creek, said he was excelling at math, too. His passion for dinosaurs continues, and "everyone in the class is his friend because he makes a good friend. His teacher told me he's caring and thinks about his classmates and how they feel."

She's not sure just what's responsible for Jacob's success.

"Some of it is us as parents, and some is just Jacob," she said. "But they definitely gave him a great foundation at the preschool. He was more than ready to go."

"Whoever has him next year will be a lucky teacher," Ms. Conley said.

-- Sally Kalson

Mallory Dietrich, high school swimmer

Darrell Sapp, Post-Gazette Mallory Dietrich graduated from Oakland Catholic High School Friday. In a few days she will leave for the Olympic Training Center in Colorado Springs, Colo., to begin workouts. Her goal is to make the 2008 Olympic team. Click photo for larger image.

Water, water everywhere could be Mallory Dietrich's motto.

Mallory, a state swimming champion, graduated from Oakland Catholic High School on Friday evening.

Academically and athletically, her ship has come in. She has accepted an appointment to the U.S. Naval Academy. Mallory will be a varsity swimmer along with her sister, Dianna, a junior-to-be.

Mallory, of Plum, chose the academy over the University of Notre Dame, with the University of Pittsburgh her third choice. She made this decision despite a five-year military commitment after graduation.

"The education there is second to none, so giving something back to my country is fine," said Mallory, 18.

She was one of the most heavily recruited scholastic swimmers from Western Pennsylvania in recent times. She swam for four varsity seasons and won 14 gold medals at the district (WPIAL) level and 12 in state (PIAA) competition. She was the 100-yard breaststroke champion in WPIAL and PIAA Class AA each of the past three years.

At the state meet March 18, Mallory broke the 100 breaststroke record she had set the year before. She is ranked 66th in the world in this event.

Mallory has a busy summer ahead. She will leave in a few days for the Olympic Training Center in Colorado Springs, Colo., where she will begin high-level workouts. Her goal is to make the 2008 Olympic team.

On June 27, she will head to Annapolis for six weeks of basic training before classes begin. Mallory isn't certain of a major, but is interested in aeronautics.

-- Rick Shrum

Jesse Sieff, vo-tech student

Darrell Sapp, Post-Gazette Tenth-grader Jesse Sieff has been spending about half of his school day at the Steel Center Area Vocational-Technical School getting a taste of the aircraft maintenance program the Pittsburgh Institute of Aeronautics offers at the school. Click photo for larger image.

Brentwood High School sophomore Jesse Sieff is soaring in his dreams and in his classes.

About a month ago, he sat in the co-pilot seat as he and members of his aviation class from the Steel Center Vocational-Technical School flew over their schools and the city in a four-seat, two-engine plane.

This year gave Jesse, 16, the first step toward being able to maintain such planes.

He has been spending about half of his school day at Steel Center Vo-Tech, where he has rotated through classes in diesel engines, computer-aided drafting and design, machine shop and electronics.

He has spent Fridays with the group that is getting a taste of the aircraft maintenance program the Pittsburgh Institute of Aeronautics offers at the vo-tech school. Four other vo-tech sophomores are in line to enter the full program next fall.

Jesse said he learned that "if I worked hard at it, I can pretty much achieve my goal of aviation."

He's also keeping up with his studies at Brentwood High, where he takes English, biology, world cultures, algebra and physical education and is on the honor roll.

"I think I made the right decision," Jesse said. "You learn things you wouldn't normally learn at your home school."

-- Eleanor Chute

Raymon Beasley, learning independence

John Beale, Post-Gazette Raymon Beasley gets ready to catch a bus from his home on the North Side to his job at Giant Eagle, South Side. He's a special needs student who was featured in the Great Beginnings education series last year. Click photo for larger image.

Raymon Beasley, 18, of the North Side, has become someone people count on.

Raymon, an unofficial graduate of Langley High School, is a special-needs student who began the school year in the Pittsburgh Public Schools' CITY, or Creating Individualized Transitions for Youth, Program.

Under state law, special-education students are eligible for the district's services up to age 21. This program is designed for those who have earned enough credits to graduate from high school but need help with life skills.

During the school year, Raymon took two PAT buses on his own to the program's center near Langley High, where he learned skills such as cooking and shopping. He works in customer service at the Giant Eagle on the South Side under the supervision of Life's Work, a nonprofit agency.

He bags groceries and does price checks, but his favorite job is pushing the shopping carts.

In March, another student in the program, a friend of his since ninth grade, died in his sleep. Raymon helped to comfort fellow classmates, went to the funeral home and gave his friend's father a big hug. He helped choose the words for the school team's bowling shirts to honor his friend.

"It's amazing how much he's grown this year," said Nancy Ziegler, his transition teacher, who said Raymon is always willing to help and is on time.

His mother, Dorothy, said she could see more independence. He has gone shopping with friends, for example.

Raymon, who said he felt good about his accomplishments, shows his happiness in his smile.

-- Eleanor Chute

Kevin Taylor, college freshman

Robin Rombach, Post-Gazette Kevin Taylor has worked part-time jobs to help supplement his scholarship at the University of Pittsburgh. He recently completed a course to become a resident assistant. If he is hired he would be able to live on campus for free. Click photo for larger image.

When last we left Kevin Taylor, he was eager to start classes at the University of Pittsburgh and full of fire to have a social life, find a girlfriend and shed the quiet, bookworm image that had defined his personality while he was an honor student at Central Catholic High School.

But it didn't take long for him to realize how difficult it was to commute each day from Mount Oliver, work a part-time job and stay on top of the enormous volume of schoolwork required to maintain his full scholarship. All of that outweighed his social aspirations and left no time for dating.

"The one thing I almost lost sight of when I began college is that I'm a full-time student," said Kevin, 19. "That's my occupation. I didn't get rewarded with an academic scholarship for being social."

Kevin discovered that, even with a full academic scholarship, the financial burdens of college can be as tough as the course work, especially when he's trying to pay his way without asking his parents for money.

He spends two hours a day after school cleaning recreational facilities in Mount Oliver and Beltzhoover and spends many weekends earning money by participating in medical experiments which sometimes require him to take experimental drugs and give blood.

"A lot of times, my family and friends frown on that, but that's the kind of stuff I have to do," he said. "I feel if I'm capable of making money, I should."

Although his grade-point average is not as high as he would like it to be, Kevin said, he has maintained the 3.0 requirement for his scholarship. He also changed his major from computer science to psychology after he realized he was far more intrigued by human behavior than machines.

He recently completed a course to become a resident assistant at a dorm on campus. There's no guarantee he'll be hired. But if he is, it would provide free room and board, eliminating his need to commute and work a part-time job.

-- Tim Grant

Ryan Menefee, college resident assistant

Matt Freed, Post-Gazette Carnegie Mellon University resident assistant Ryan Menefee, left, greets new student Chris Herlich. Ryan said a pair of ears became one of his best tools for helping others. "I was really surprised at how people ... want you to sit down and listen ." Click photo for larger image.

As a newly trained resident assistant in a dormitory at Carnegie Mellon University, sophomore Ryan Menefee, of Plano, Texas, saw plenty of change this year, in himself and in the 19 freshmen on his floor in Mudge House who were entrusted to him.

The new arrivals faced more than the jolt of being away from home and assorted personal issues. As the semester wore on, Ryan found himself increasingly working with them to better organize study habits on a campus with a grueling workload.

A pair of ears, he said, became one of his best tools for helping students find themselves.

"I was really surprised at how people really just want you to sit down and listen to what they have to say," he said. "They don't necessarily even want a solution. They just want you to listen.

"A lot of people lost touch with [hometown] friends more quickly than they imagined."

Ryan, 20, was one of 58 brand-new RAs on a campus drawing students from 47 states and 22 other countries. He entered the job not fully knowing what to expect.

As it turns out, there were no cataclysms on the floor, no emergency that sent anyone to the hospital. But a year's worth of mentoring and seeing the freshmen succeed and grow left him more confident of his own leadership ability, he said. He found himself looking upon residents of his floor with pride, "the way a parent would."

"This job changed me a lot more than I thought it would."

Ryan said he planned to study this summer and fall in China and would work as a community adviser at Carnegie Mellon's Qatar campus next spring.

-- Bill Schackner

Jonathan and Emily Cilley, liberal arts grads

Matt Houston, Associated Press Newlyweds and recent liberal arts graduates of Allegheny College Jonathan and Emily Cilley were able to find new jobs in Bethesda, Md. Jonathan said he still would choose liberal arts, "The writing skills Allegheny gave me are invaluable." Click photo for larger image.

When Jonathan and Emily Cilley graduated from Allegheny College and were married nearly a year ago, they had to figure out how to parlay their liberal arts degrees -- his in history; hers in history and literature -- into jobs.

They moved to Maryland, where Jonathan, with a boost from experience as a Web developer, landed a job at a computer firm. But Emily didn't have a job.

Now both of their careers are in motion.

Jonathan, 23, who had been an applications developer, has been promoted to a project manager with E-sight Marketing in Bethesda, Md., about 20 miles from their two-bedroom apartment in Germantown.

Jonathan said, "I love it. I don't think I could have asked for a better job right out of college."

He said he still would choose the liberal arts. "The writing skills Allegheny gave me are invaluable and so are the critical thinking skills that I don't think I would have gotten anywhere else," he said.

In October, Emily, 22, became an editorial assistant for Biophysical Journal, also in Bethesda, a position she found through want ads in The Washington Post.

Emily said, "It's a good job to start out with, and it offers me experience to build with."

She thinks her biggest drawback on the job market was a lack of an internship, but she is glad she chose the liberal arts.

"When I graduated, I was concerned I didn't know exactly what I wanted to do," she said, adding that now she realizes "it's OK I don't know exactly what I want to do. At age 22, I don't have to be set in a career path for the rest of my life."

-- Eleanor Chute