Excellence in education

By Staff
The Meridian Community College Foundation has tapped two local high school graduates to serve as the 2001-02 Ruth Van Dyke Nelson Scholars.
John Walter Coker and Morgan Wright will each receive $l,000 scholarships from a memorial endowment set up by Art Nelson through The Foundation.
Valedictorian of his Southeast High School graduating class, Coker is an engineering major. He played baseball there as well as serving on the Student Advisory Council and on the All-Scholastic Sports Team. He was a member of the Beta Club and sings in his church choir.
Wright, a highest honors graduate of Clarkdale Attendance Center, plans to pursue a pre-med program of study. She was an outstanding softball and soccer player and made the All-American 2nd Team and won the Army Scholastic/Athlete Award. She also served on the Student Council, the National Honor Society and the Spanish Honor Society. Active as a Sunday School teacher and as director of the Youth Choir, Wright was also a volunteer softball 8-U coach.
COLUMBUS Mississippi University for Women student Hollie Campe of Collinsville has been selected to receive a $1,193 English Scholarship for the 2001-02 academic year.
This award, funded by an anonymous donor, goes to an English major based on scholastic achievement.
Founded in 1884 as the first public college for women in America and admitting men since l982, MUW is ranked the No. 1 Southern public liberal arts college by US. News &World Report for the fourth straight year. This is the seventh consecutive year that the university has been in the top 10 among its peers for academic reputation and campus diversity.
Seven residents from Lauderdale County were among the 554 graduates at Alcorn State University's 130th Commencement Exercises held May 12, in the Jack Spinks Stadium.
Lauderdale county residents who received bachelor's degrees were Reginald Carter, Desshondra Walker (magna cum laude), Nadia Washington and Maurice Williams.
Magna cum laude honors graduates cumulated between a 3.50-3.79 grade point average.
Lauderdale county residents who received master's degrees were Shana Hopkins, Charlotte Williams and Carmalita Alford.
Several students from the area were recently elected members of the executive committee of Gamma Gamma Chapter of Alpha Sigma Tau at the University of West Alabama
They were: President Stacey Carr of Meridian; Recording Secretary Melissa Gressett of Newton; Treasurer Augusta Holloway of Meridian; Recruitment Director Kristen Strickland of Livingston, Ala.; and Housing Director Theresa Marson of Livingston;
The following members were elected to the staff of AST. Courtesy Chairman Sonia Moore of Livingston; Social Director Jacie Bridges of Meridian; By Laws Chairman Melissa Gressett of Newton; and Treasurer Assistant Christina Curtis of Demopolis, Ala.
The United States Achievement Academy announces that Jeann H. Brown of Livingston, Ala. has been named an All-American Collegiate Scholar.
She currently attends East Mississippi Community College. Brown is the daughter of James and Christine Hutchins of Emelle, Ala. She is the granddaughter of Christine and Elijah Bell of Sumterville, Ala. and Alberta Johnson and George Hutchins of Hamner, Ala.
The USAA has established the All-American Collegiate Award Program to offer deserved recognition to superior students who excel in the academic disciplines.
Fifteen students from the area were among 1600 candidates for graduation from the University of Mississippi at the conclusion of the Spring semester.
They were: Denise Stewart, Robert Maurice Dreyfus, Robert Johnson Marsalis, Jaime Lee Purdy, Brooke Andrea Lawyer, Benjamin Wade Wilkerson, Kino Marques Mosley, Fredrick Adam Pennebaker, Justin Miller Cobb and Mary Emmalee Parkes, all of Meridian; Kristy Lou Brashier, Christina Golden and Josiefina Golden, all of Collinsville; Bertha H. Langin of Lauderdale; and Wesley David Landrum of Marion.