The following day, a surprise congratulatory graduation party was held at SCR, before the start of his shift for the day. After working in the health care field as a certified nursing assistant, among other service-industry jobs for the past 25 years, he said working at the casino has been more than he could have hoped for.Ī few of his colleagues attended his drive-thru graduation ceremony at the Hemet Adult School July 17. This company put me first – and that’s never happened to me before,” he said. That did not happen until he started working for the Soboba Band of Luiseño Indians a few months ago. Finishing school was not an immediate priority for him but Townsend, now 51, believed he would eventually have an opportunity to return and get his diploma. As a teenager, living in Massachusetts and Rhode Island, he got off track and dropped out of high school.īecoming a father at the age of 16 created an obligation to go to work. When Dayshawn Townsend became employed by Soboba Casino Resort in San Jacinto he did not know that it would lead to his fulfillment of a longtime goal he had set for himself.