Defying the Odds, Student to Graduate After Spending Five Months in a Coma

(University of Toronto) – When Carisse Samuel joins her fellow graduates at the University of Toronto’s virtual convocation this Saturday, the celebration will be both an academic and personal victory.

In addition to completing assignments and studying for tests in her digital enterprise management program at U of T Mississauga, Samuel was thrown a curveball: a sudden and severe brain injury that profoundly reshaped her life.

Back in November of 2016, Samuel, then 21, was a second-year student living on her own in a rented basement apartment near campus.

She says she was “having a grand old time with friends, going to classes – it was beginning to be one of my best years. I was going to be on the honour roll.” CONTINUE