The Arvada-Wheat Ridge Service Ambassadors for Youth (AWRSAY) will publicly honor 46 youth who have overcome various forms of adversity at its seventh annual recognition ceremony at 6 p.m. April 9 at Pomona High School, 8101 Pomona Drive, Arvada.
The AWRSAY program honors middle and high school youth from Arvada and Wheat Ridge who have demonstrated personal strength, resiliency and determination in overcoming adversity and making positive changes in their lives or in the lives of those with whom they come in contact. Example areas of overcoming adversity include education/learning, emotional, personal, social, physical and academic.
The program is unique because it is a collaboration of service clubs, businesses and the cities of Arvada and Wheat Ridge, The Jefferson Foundation, Red Rocks Community College Foundation and Red Rocks Community College Arvada campus. All funding is raised by the service clubs with support from businesses and individual contributions. In its first six years, AWRSAY has recognized 330 students. With this year's honorees, 376 students have been recognized with a total of 164 having received scholarships.
Students being recognized this year are:
Valentina Brown - Wheat Ridge Middle School
Jared Bryan - North Arvada Middle School
Arthur Conklin - Wheat Ridge Middle School
Yuliana Espinoza - Drake Middle School
Kailey Ford - Drake Middle School
Felicia Gilmore - North Arvada Middle School
Brooke King - Moore Middle School
Xia Laniel - Drake Middle School
Desiree Lawrence - Wheat Ridge High School
Fernanda Martinez - Jefferson High School
Genevieve Martinez - Wheat Ridge Middle School
Elijah Quintanilla - Arvada High School
Derek Riemer - Oberon Middle School
Tyler Salen - Oberon Middle School
Nicole Sanchez - Arvada High School
Richard Schemmel - Arvada High School
Alia Sheya - Drake Middle School
Ariel Tovar - Arvada Middle School
Kristen Vasquez - Drake Middle School
Amber Westerfield - North Arvada Middle School
Sheylinn Work - Drake Middle School
Senior high school students being recognized this year with scholarships are:
Kandy Arellano-Treto - Jefferson High School
Deacon Aspinwall - Arvada High School
Gabe Baca - Jefferson High School
Kevin Calkins - Arvada High School
Lucas Campbell - Arvada West High School
Kayoua Cha - Arvada High School
Amber Crowell - Wheat Ridge High School
Shumet Demie - Pomona High School
Brittany Fiala - Wheat Ridge High School
Maddie Holmes - Jefferson High School
Quianne Holmes - Wheat Ridge High School
Kamila Hosaja - Pomona High School
Kelsie Hutchinson - Ralston Valley High School
Mariam Ibdaiwi - Arvada High School
Amber Johnson - Arvada High School
John Kennedy - Wheat Ridge High School
Atsedu Kidane - Arvada High School
Luis Larios - Jefferson High School
Brittany Padgett - Wheat Ridge High School
Taylor Platt - Arvada High School
Christine Shehan - Pomona High School
Misha Trujillo - Arvada High School
Sasha VanHeesch - Arvada West School
Jamie Wassam - Arvada High School
Cheng Yang - Arvada High School
For more information about the program, call
Dan Macy at 303-914-6016.
Veronica Bennett works for Jeffco Public Schools communications services.