Twenty-three Pocahontas County Students Honored As Hidden Promise Scholars

Marlinton,WV – Twenty-three Pocahontas County students were recognized as Hidden Promise Scholars at the Pocahontas County Board of Education meeting Monday night. Ranging in age from eighth graders to high school seniors, they are all recognized as students with great potential by the Glenville State College scholarship program.

The Hidden Promise Scholars consortium was formed about 4 years ago, according to Glenville President Dr. Peter Barr. 17 West Virginia counties, including Pocahontas, participate in the program. Additionally, 20 counites in Ohio and the City of Belpre are also part of the consortium. While Dr. Barr certainly hopes students will choose to go to Glenville State, he says more importantly he just wants students to go to college. He explains how the program got it’s name.

“Because we believe the true Hidden Promise of West Virginia lies in its people; and especially in its young people” he says. “And so we said to [school] Superintendents, if you could just identify kids in the eighth, ninth, tenth, eleventh and twelth grade; kids that hold the hidden promise of West Virginia. The kids that need to go to college, the kids who will be the future leaders of West Virginia.”

And that’s exactly what Pocahontas County Schools Superintendent CC Lester did. The eighth grade Hidden Promise Scholars from Pocahontas County are James Campbell, Kimberly Lester, Stephen Mick III, and Kaitlin Sharp from Marlinton Middle School and Kindra Carr, Phillip Green, Daniel Gum, Sarah Lambert and Heather Pritt from Green Bank Middle School. At Pocahontas County HS, the scholars include freshman Joseph Coy, Clay Friel, Amanda Gibson, Brooke Irvine, and Lorena Rose, sophomores Derek Hamman and Patrick Martin III, juniors Santana Beck, Elizabeth Fuller, Dillon Hovorka, Skyler Knisely and Chasten Taylor, and seniors William Bostic and Seth Doss.

Dr. Barr’s executive assistant, Teresa Sterns gave the students and parents some additional information about the program. Students are required to attend grade specific summer camps held at Glenville. She says they’re also required to work with a mentor.

“Each one of you will have a mentor assigned to you, and that mentor will call you and you parents” says Sterns. “They are supposed to call and talk to you once a month. All of our mentors have went [sic] criminal background checks and we monitor conversations with Facebook and email.”

The purpose of the mentors and the camps is to better prepare students for the rigors of college life and for life after college. For those who choose to attend Glenville, there is an extra incentive – a $1000.00 per year scholarship.

Keith Barr is the Hidden Promise Coordinator and camp coordinator. The focus of the 8th and 9th grade camps is to help students figure out what kind of career they want. The 10th grade camp is focused on ACT test preparation. 11th graders learn how to do a resume,how to write a college application letter and other self advocacy skills. The twelth grade camp is for those who didn’t do as well on the ACT test. It’s designed to help the kids avoid expensive remedial classes at college that don’t count towards their degree. The camps are not all work and no play, says Barr.

“In the evening times, I teach fundamentals of boxing, we play basketball, volleyball, we’re going to the creek, we’re camping” he says. “We’ve got a criminal justice lab we take the kids to; science labs [where] they can do experiments, all kinds of fun things. We’re not strapping you down to a chair making you do all that stuff – in the evening times we have fun.”

For more information on the Hidden Promise Scholar program at Glenville State College, you can visit www.glenville.edu.