Fort Bend Leadership Class of 2012 visiting Rosenberg City Hall with Mayor Vincent Morales.

Fort Bend Regional Council on Substance Abuse, Inc. (FBRC) along with Lamar Consolidated Independent School District will join Fort Bend County community leaders to host Leadership High School 2013.  This annual initiative will unite 60 teens from four LCISD high schools, alumni leaders, FBRC staff and school district and community volunteers to empower students to be leaders within their community.

This program is made possible by the George Foundation, the Union Pacific Foundation, the Fred and Mabel R. Parks Foundation and many other community supporters.

This week long program runs June 10th – 14th and will assist students in gaining  knowledge of county government, Fort Bend’s diversity as a community, philanthropy, service and volunteerism, economic development and municipal government.  Students will participate in a Home Makeover project on a home in Rosenberg, TX, visit with senior citizens at the Fort Bend Meals on Wheels center and participate in a mock trial at the Fort Bend County Courthouse. They will also participate in fun competitive activities such as paintballing, canoeing and a water balloon launching contest.

Fort Bend Regional Council on Substance Abuse, Inc. has served the community of Fort Bend County from its Stafford and Rosenberg offices since 1976.  FBRC comprehensively addresses substance abuse.  Through youth prevention and leadership programs, students learn life skills including communication, healthy ways to reduce stress, peer interactions, handling adversity and positive decision making.  FBRC also offers treatment for individuals and families struggling with addiction and outreach programs to help families and communities stay safe and drug free.  The joy of family restoration and the knowledge that the cycle of addiction has been broken is a daily celebration at FBRC.

For more information on Fort Bend Regional Council, please visit their website at www.fortbendcouncil.org or call 281-207-2400.

Campbell Elementary music teacher Sue Austin is the Elementary Teacher of the Year and Reading Junior High English teacher Ann Cantu is the Secondary Teacher of the Year for Lamar CISD.

Dorothea Enax, receptionist at Lamar Junior High, is the Secondary Paraprofessional of the Year and Velma Bauer, teacher’s aide at Velasquez Elementary is the Elementary Paraprofessional of the Year.

The nominees for Secondary Teacher of the Year were:
Emanuel Ibe, ALC; Timothy Bristol, Briscoe Jr. High; Jared Murphy, Foster High School; Lisa B. McNally, George Jr. High; Gary Gazaway, George Ranch High School; Kristin Rausch, Lamar Consolidated High School; Robin Nash, Lamar Jr. High; Javonne Grant, Navarro Middle School; Shanna Wenzel, Terry High School; Michele Broom, Wertheimer Middle School; and  Brenda Kort-Sanchez, Wessendorff Middle School.

Candidates for Elementary Teacher of the Year were:
Lorrie M. Rackar, Austin Elementary; Sarah Chernohorsky, Beasley Elementary; Tamra Rhoden, Bowie Elementary; Megan Hogg, Dickinson Elementary; Alicia Roberts, Frost Elementary; Carrie Grigar, Hubenak Elementary; Christine Jaster, Huggins Elementary; Kelley Emmott, Hutchison Elementary; Lisa Moss, Jackson Elementary; Sarah Graham, Long Elementary; Ashley Hayes, McNeill Elementary; Natalie Oaks, Meyer Elementary; Stacie Johnson, Pink Elementary; Youngmee Hsu, Ray Elementary; Lydia C. Torres, Seguin Early Childhood Center; Dolores Perez, Smith Elementary; Pamela Clayton Thomas Elementary; Rebecca Hlavinka Travis Elementary; LaShun King Velasquez Elementary;  and Kasey Sorbel, Williams Elementary.
The nominees for Elementary Paraprofessional of the Year were:
Cathy Willis, Austin Elementary; Sheri Hajovsky, Beasley Elementary; Sandra Lopez, Bowie Elementary; Gloria Smith, Campbell Elementary; Kristen Santana, Dickinson Elementary; Patricia Ball, Frost Elementary; Judith Medina, Hubenak Elementary; Rosalie Ramirez, Huggins Elementary; Kristina Magallan, Hutchison Elementary; Maria L. Gonzales, Jackson Elementary; Joyce Thomas, Long Elementary; Meredith Vance, McNeill Elementary; Diane Wood, Meyer Elementary; Julie Chapa, Pink Elementary; Brenda Gonzalez Valdez, Ray Elementary; Mary Santana, Seguin Early Childhood Center; Ryan Brady, Smith Elementary; Tonya Head, Thomas Elementary; Jeanette Vasquez, Travis Elementary; and Wanda Polk, Williams Elementary.

LCTA winners: Secondary Paraprofessional of the Year Dorothea Enax; Secondary Teacher of the Year, Ann Cantu; Elementary Teacher of the Year, Sue Austin; and Elementary Paraprofessional of the Year, Velma Bauer.

The nominees for Secondary Paraprofessional of the Year were:
Apifania Nanes, ALC; Secundino Alameda, Navarro Middle School; Cheryl McGill, Wertheimer Middle School; Clarita Cantrell, Wessendorff Middle School; Sandi Tamez, Briscoe Jr. High; Devona Green, George Jr. High; Tammy Korenek, Reading Jr. High; Delores Sanchez, Foster High School; Nikki Agner, George Ranch High School; Natalie Crump, Lamar Consolidated High School; and Betsy Foster, Terry High School.

Cara Hoskins

Cara Hoskins will be the assistant principal at Adolphus Elementary when it opens in August. Hoskins has her bachelors and masters degrees from Prairie View A&M and 16 years of experience in education, including six years as assistant principal at Hutchison Elementary in Lamar CISD.

She taught at Campbell Elementary in LCISD, as well as in schools in Houston and Fort Bend ISD’s.

Sandra Glenn

Sandra Glenn will be the assistant principal at Velasquez Elementary for the 2013-2014 school year. A graduate of Lamar University, she has her masters from the University of Houston-Victoria. She has 23 years of experience in education, including five years as an assistant principal in Alief ISD.

Glenn taught at Williams Elementary for two years and in Alief and Port Arthur ISDs, as well as in Virginia.

Nanci is a senior at Lamar Consolidated High School and opted to take this 7 week workshop to enhance her business and leadership skills. Nanci is majoring in accounting and will attend Wharton County Junior College this fall.

She wrote a comprehensive essay on the subjects she learned, like resume building, interviews, and dressing for the interview, financial planning and more. For her attendance and the essay she received $500.00 for her efforts. The Edmunds Foundation would like to thank all of the volunteers that made this program a success, as well as the Workforce Solutions for letting us use their facilities to host this program as well as all their supportive counselors.

Cyrus Montanya, Shelby Guel and Faith Orakwue.

You literally have to be “one in a thousand” to receive a Gates Millennium Scholarship.
For Lamar CISD, it was three in a thousand. Terry High School’s Shelby Rae Guel, Foster High School’s Cyrus Montanya and Lamar Consolidated High School’s Chimsom Faith Orakwue are the District’s fourth, fifth and sixth Gates Scholars – the first for Terry and Foster, but the third consecutive year a Mustang has earned the honor.

Each year, the Gates Millennium Scholars Program selects only 1,000 talented students to receive a good-through-graduation scholarship to use at any college or university of their choice. That includes any graduate school the students choose. The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation also provides Gates Millennium Scholars with personal and professional development through a leadership programs along with academic support throughout their college careers.

According to the Gates Millennium Scholar website, more than 54,000 members of the high school class of 2013 applied for the scholarship.

Two of the students have medical school planned for their future. Orakwue plans to attend Columbia University in New York City, eventually becoming a pediatrician and returning to her native Nigeria to practice medicine.

Guel has her sights set on the University of Texas in Austin, with the long-range goal of being a psychiatrist and serving in the U.S. Army.

Montanya, who was born in Kenya, will attend Harvard and major in biomedical engineering. Upon finishing his undergraduate degree, Montanya said that medical school, law school and business school are all possibilities.

“I had Faith as both a 9th – and 10th-grader in Pre-AP English, and from the start Faith struck me as a bright, ambitious young girl,” said Lorry Sumers, one of the Lamar Consolidated teachers who nominated Orakwue. “I was happy to recommend her to the Gates Committee, and I focused my comments on my true belief that Faith embodies the ideal that we hope for when we dream of those who will guide our future.

“This is a girl who’s going places!” Sumers said.

Terry High teacher Louis Horton taught Guel’s pre-calculus and calculus. He recommended her for the Gates Scholarship because of her academic ability and work-ethic.

“Shelby is a great young woman who has nothing but positives in her future. Shelby is able to quickly process mathematical concepts and apply them to any problem set presented to her,” Horton said. “She is a resource to others in class who are struggling.  She freely offers assistance when needed and is quite an accomplished teacher.”

“I have worked with lots of brilliant kids in my career,” said Patricia Byers, the registrar at Foster who nominated Montanya for the scholarship, “but I have never worked with one who also had as big of a heart as Cyrus Motanya.

“Kind, thoughtful, studious and intelligent, he is a scholar and a compassionate gentleman” Byers said. “I look forward to following his career through the coming years because the sky is the limit for him!”

The road to being a Gates Scholar is long and difficult. Not only does a student have to have excellent grades, demonstrate leadership and have the recommendation of an educator, but a winning student will have written eight different essays by the end of the process.

Among those honored were employees that have served 20-, 25-, 30- and 35-year-veterans.

20-year veterans
Pamela Clayton, Diana Martinez, Sandra Barela, Melinda Morgan, Maria Madrigal, Kimberly Matthews, Lorenso Longoria; 2nd row, Karol Behne, Juan Nava, Dora Pineda, Gloria Ramos, Joy Rosenbaum and, top row, Tracy Madrigal.

Not pictured are Karen Abbe, Jayla Allen, Romeo Argueta, Suzanne Bromberg, Maria Camacho, Diana Chapa, Rebecca Guntle, Paul Gutowsky, James Jedlicka, Sherry Miller, Alma Newell, Tracy Perry, Kimberly Reyhons, Mario Santos, Carole Serna, Lisa Sulak, Patricia Talbert, Alfred Tobola and Katherine Trevino.

25-year veterans
Stephanie Love, Sheri Hajovsky, Adriana Zamora, Alfredo Montalbo, Tammy Ellis, Kitty Scalf, Juanita Corralez; 2nd row,
Suzanne Stavinoha, Gay Crissman, Mary Vargas, Gloria Cuellar Kyle, Helen Morgan, Violanda Mata, Dawn Till, and top middle, Sandra Guyton.

Not pictured are Marta Elkins, Katharine Kail, Mary Kettler, Virginia Krejci, Michael Kure, Anna Lopez, Holly Padilla, Karen Slavinski, Barbara Stamps and Jeannette Vasquez.

30-year veterans
Irma Nurre, Rhett Gray, Cynthia Salch, Marlene Napps, Carla Kueck, Jeff Kimble; 2nd row, Jan Payne, Ken Walla, Eileen Wildy and Patricia Neal. Not pictured is Troy Kettler

35-year veterans
Mary Lopez, Estella McGill, Beverly Richard, Lydia Torres; 2nd row Helen Daniels and Gene Tomas. Not pictured are Alphonse Harris and Louise Phillips.

Each year, the Gates Millennium Scholars Program selects only 1,000 talented students to receive a “good-through-graduation” scholarship to use at any college or university of their choice. The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation also provides Gates Millennium Scholars with personal and professional development through a leadership programs along with academic support throughout their college careers.

According to the Gates Millennium Scholar website, more than 54,000 members of the high school class of 2013 applied for the scholarship.

Both students have medical school planned for their future. Orakwue plans to attend Columbia University in New York City, eventually becoming a pediatrician and returning to her native Nigeria to practice medicine.

Guel has her sights set on the University of Texas in Austin, with the long-range goal of being a psychiatrist and serving in the U.S. Army.

“I had Faith as both a 9th – and 10th-grader in Pre-AP English, and from the start Faith struck me as a bright, ambitious young girl,” said Lorry Sumers, one of the Lamar Consolidated teachers who nominated Orakwue. “I was happy to recommend her to the Gates Committee, and I focused my comments on my true belief that Faith embodies the ideal that we hope for when we dream of those who will guide our future.

“This is a girl who’s going places!” Sumers said.

Terry High teacher Louis Horton taught Guel’s pre-calculus and calculus. He recommended her for the Gates Scholarship because of her academic ability and work-ethic.

“Shelby is a great young woman who has nothing but positives in her future. She is able to quickly process mathematical concepts and apply them to any problem set presented to her,” Horton said. “Shelby is a resource to others in class who are struggling and freely offers assistance when needed and is quite an accomplished teacher.”

The road to being a Gates Scholar is long and difficult. Not only does a student have to have excellent grades, demonstrate leadership and have the recommendation of an educator, but a winning student will have written eight different essays by the end of the process.

Haugvoll has 20 years of experience in education, including 13 years of teaching experience including Fort Bend and Katy schools. She also has seven years of administrative experience as the Assistant Principal at Bowie Elementary, where she currently works.

Belynda Billings will be the Assistant Principal at Williams Elementary. She is a graduate of the University of Houston-Victoria and received her master’s degree from Prairie View A&M University.

Billings has 19 years of experience in education, including seven years of teaching in Lamar Consolidated and Wharton schools and 13 years of experience as an interventionist/facilitator in Sealy and Lamar Consolidated schools.

Billings is currently the Math Facilitator at Briscoe Junior High.

Dana Maresh will be the Assistant principal at Hutchison Elementary.

She is a graduate of Texas A&M University and received her master’s degree from Lamar University. Maresh has 15 years of experience in education, including 10 years of teaching experience in Lamar Consolidated, Needville and Bryan schools. She has five years of experience as a facilitator, all in Lamar Consolidated.

Maresh is currently serving as the Math Facilitator at Meyer Elementary. She was the 2011 Elementary Teacher of the Year in Lamar Consolidated.