From the Milly Rock to the Moonwalk, every move Corinne Williams makes is a miracle. The 17-year-old from Covington has a lot to celebrate these days, after she received an acceptance letter from her dream culinary program at Johnson and Wales University.
Her mother, Kimya Motley, recorded this video shortly after she got the news – and to call it a “happy dance” would just be an understatement.
Williams’ journey to this moment hasn’t been an easy one. When she was 10 years old, she and her mother were both shot in the head by her mother’s ex-husband while they were dropped off at daycare.
Motley was a kindergarten teacher in Conyers and filed for divorce from her estranged husband, Terrance Sherrod Roberson, just before the shooting in 2011.
She was getting Williams out of the car to catch a bus from a daycare center to Lorraine Middle School when Roberson pulled up and opened fire.
That moment when he pulled the trigger, Motley said, was like a terrible dream.
“I’m on the ground and I’m saying, ‘no, no, no’ … and he shoots me in the back of my head,” Motley said. “I saw Corinne’s head drop and I just assumed that her head dropped because she didn’t want to see what was happening to me.”
Roberson turned himself in after the shooting and confessed to the crime. He was sentenced to 65 years in prison.
Motley was shot in the head, with a bullet traveling through her jaw and collarbone. She was told she would survive, but her daughter’s skull was shattered. They said she would die before nightfall – but, Williams made it through the night.
“I just remember waking up in the hospital and everyone around me,” Williams said.
The prognosis wasn’t good. Doctors to Motley that her daughter wouldn’t make it another 72 hours. Then they said she would be paralyzed for the rest of her life.
“Doctors said she wouldn’t live, BUT GOD … doctors said she would be paralyzed, BUT GOD,” Motley wrote in a GoFundMe post she’s started to help fund her daughter’s education. “She has learned how to hold her head up, walk, talk, read, write, do math.”
Williams went on to play basketball and soccer – all while pursuing her dreams to go to Johnson and Wales University culinary school, to practice her craft alongside famous alumni like Emeril Lagasse and Tyler Florence.
Teen shot in head accepted into culinary school
“I am just in awe, I can’t believe any of this is happening to me,” Williams said. I thought I would, I thought I would really drop out of school. I really thought I couldn’t go on any longer, it was very hard for me to keep moving forward.”
Williams said she first learned about the school when she was in ninth grade – and ever since that’s been her dream.
“I like working with food and making other people happy by what I make,” she said.
Williams has received a scholarship to help pay for her tuition. She’s so confident in her skills, she’s already thrown out a challenge to her favorite celebrity chefs.
“One day, I want to have my own Food Network show, maybe beat Bobby Flay,” Williams said. “I think I can, I really do. I think I can beat Bobby Flay.”
Her mother said every achievement her child reaches is a miracle.
“I saw this child fight to get every piece of her life back, she defied all the odds,” Motley said.
Williams had some advice for anyone going through a tough time.
“Don’t just focus on today,” she said. “Focus on the future, and what’s going to happen for you.”
Help Williams pay for her education by contributing to her GoFundMe account.