The Dublin Kid Who Stopped Hiding

Local News

There’s a wealth management firm in Bridge Park that manages about $2.5 billion for clients across the country.

And this week, it landed a pretty significant new team.

Ascend Advisory Group is headquartered on Longshore Street and helps individuals and families manage their money, from investing and retirement planning to taxes and estate planning.

The company has actually been around since 2001. It started with just $27 million under management and has since grown to serve clients in 44 states.

Now seven people are leaving UBS to join the firm. Together, they had been managing about $1.3 billion for their clients.

That money doesn’t necessarily come with them — the clients decide whether to follow their advisors. But it does tell you something about the kind of business Ascend has built here.

A firm that started with $27 million under management in 2001 is now attracting a team that was responsible for more than $1 billion.

And they’re doing it from an office right here in Bridge Park.

Local News

Dublin City Schools celebrated International Translation Day yesterday, which might seem like an oddly specific day for a school district to recognize. But the numbers the district shared along with it tell a pretty interesting story about just how international Dublin has become.

There are about 16,800 students in Dublin City Schools, and together they speak more than 100 different languages. Our students come from more than 80 countries, and about 2,200 of them are classified as English Learners.

That last number is worth putting into perspective. Roughly one out of every eight kids in Dublin Schools is learning English while also learning math, science, history and everything else that comes with being a student.

Which means translation is a much bigger part of everyday life in our schools than most of us probably realize. And International Translation Day suddenly doesn’t seem like such an unusual thing for Dublin Schools to celebrate.

Local News

Remember Andre Roberts? We’ve written about him a couple of times before. He’s the Dublin Coffman grad who’s now a captain of the Ohio State soccer team and was named one of the Big Ten’s Players to Watch this season.

But there’s another part of Andre’s story you may not know.

When he was 8 years old, Andre was diagnosed with alopecia, an autoimmune condition that caused him to lose his hair. At first, he tried to hide the growing bald spots by getting his hair cut shorter and shorter. Eventually, his barber told him there really wasn’t anything left to save, so Andre shaved it all off.

Andre remembers feeling relieved. He wasn’t trying to hide it anymore.

But what really comes through in the story isn’t the alopecia. It’s how Andre learned to deal with something in his life he couldn’t control.

His parents taught him to “control the controllables.” Former Ohio State football star Ryan Shazier, who also has alopecia, visited his elementary school and helped him understand that looking different didn’t have to limit him.

And Andre kept playing soccer.

He eventually went from playing here in Dublin to becoming a captain at Ohio State. And now, when younger kids with alopecia reach out to him, Andre is the one helping them understand that same lesson.

“Alopecia is going to be a part of you. Just don’t let it be the main part.”

That’s obviously a lesson about a lot more than losing your hair.

The Big Ten Network just did a powerful feature on Andre’s story, the great support from his family and what he’s learned along the way.

It’s worth a few minutes of your time. You can check it out here.