Zephaniah Gore was a seventh-grader when, at the urging of a friend, he started going to the Boys & Girls Club in Columbus after school. He didn’t know exactly what to expect, but what he discovered was a place that is opening doors to his future. This past week, it also added an honor he will always be proud to have on his resume: Gore was selected by a panel of judges to represent the Boys & Girls Clubs of the Golden Triangle as Youth of the Year.
The program is a national effort to foster a new generation of leaders prepared to live and lead in a diverse, global world economy. On March 25, Gore will advance to the state level competition. The winner there will receive a $5,000 scholarship and move on to regional competition, with an opportunity to receive an additional $10,000 college scholarship, renewable for four years, up to $40,000. Six youth, including five regional winners and a military winner, will ultimately advance to the National Youth of the Year Celebration, with the chance at an additional scholarship of $25,000, renewable up to $100,000, for four years. The National Youth of the Year will represent all Boys & Girls Club youth as a national teen spokesperson.
“I was surprised and honored at the same time,” said Gore Thursday.
Judges were impressed by all three candidates vying to represent the Golden Triangle in this 70-plus-year-old national Youth of the Year program. Each demonstrated maturity and dedication to the club and its ideals.
“Our judges were Mrs. Renee Sanders, executive director for United Way; Mr. Douglass Cockrell, former Boys & Girls Club Parent Advisory Council president and chair for the Boys & Girls Club Safety Team; and Mrs. Yolanda Pruitt, Mississippi Tobacco Coalition director,” said Boys & Girls Club Columbus Unit Director Brittany Turner.
Sanders remarked, “I am so grateful that there are still young people that have the desire to become leaders in the community. What impressed me the most about the competitors was their ability to think quick on their feet and to recover and respond quickly. They were all very well prepared.”
Gore’s ability to articulate his Boys & Girls Club experience so effectively stood out to judges. As did his leadership qualities, one of the reasons he’s been employed at the Columbus location on 14th Avenue North as a junior staffer since February 2020. It’s been a year like no other.
With the club’s daily routines paused due to the COVID-19 pandemic, staff, including junior members, had to dig deep to create alternative programming, ways to reach out to the children who would normally fill the facility every day after school with laughter, study and physical activity. Turner and her teams brainstormed, creating strategies for everything from maintaining regular contact and supporting academic excellence in a new cyber environment, to developing virtual learning videos.
“(Junior staffers) help mentor our elementary and middle school students, and they are engaged and involved in the community,” Turner said.
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When asked what his teen years might be like had he not gotten so involved at the Boys & Girls Club, Gore said he might have ended up one of the kids who just hang out after school, with nothing very productive to do. Instead, he reports to the Columbus club after attending school on Mondays and Tuesdays, and then is at the club from noon until 5 p.m. Wednesdays through Fridays.
“It’s opened doors for my future, with opportunities for job shadowing, and now I’m doing staff work here and that’s getting me ready for future jobs,” he said.
He’d like to attend Jackson State after graduation from Columbus High. He aspires to study meteorology, a field he’s been interested in since watching news and weather broadcasts with his mother when he was younger.
At the club, he not only is part of a support system for younger students, he’s also surrounded by a support network himself. It consists of those he interacts with almost every day. He wishes all youngsters could experience the benefits.
“I just like to help kids and help other staff members,” said the young man. “The Boys & Girls Club is so important because it gives kids more opportunities to have fun, to learn. And they prepare them for life after school and keep them on the right path instead of going down the wrong road.”
The National Youth of the Year program celebrates inspiring teens and their journeys, Turner said. It helps motivate kids to lead, to succeed. Outstanding teens taking part represent the voice and spirit of hope for America.
Jan Swoope is the Lifestyles Editor for The Commercial Dispatch.
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