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Our Future, Our Commitment, Our Students

Principal Profile

Learn more about Long Mill

Elementary School Principal

Kim Ferrell. Page 2

Top Honors

Former FCS student Jason

King graduates Valedictorian

from NCSU. Page 3

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F I R S T T H U R S D A Y V O L U M E 4 , I S S U E 5

Franklin County Schools

D.C. Bound Novozymes

Grant Nets

$25K For

FHS Lab Grant Process Initiated

Through FCS CTE

The Franklinton High School biotechnology program has received a huge boost – a boost in the form of $15,000 from a grant through No-vozymes to fund a new lab. In addition, Novozymes has do-nated nearly $10,000 worth of lab equipment.

Novozymes representatives Kevin Potter and Paige Don-nelly made the official presen-tation during the April 27th

FCS Superintendent Dr. Bert L’Homme, seen here speaking with students, will begin a new career in Washington, D.C. on July 1st. L’Homme spent 23 years working in DC prior to moving to North Carolina in 1994.

For more than five years, Franklin County Schools has been under the leadership of Superintendent Dr. Bert L’Homme.

That will all change June 30th, 2009. L’Homme submitted his resig-nation letter April 27th to the Board of Education to pursue an employment opportunity with the Children’s De-fense Fund (CDF) in Washington, D.C. In D.C., he will be the Director of Education Policy and Coordinator

of the Cradle to Prison Pipeline Cru-sade.

“I’m in my 31st year of education, and this is a very unique opportunity for me,” L’Homme said. “It was a dif-ficult decision for both me and my family. We love this area, and I’ve truly enjoyed working as Superinten-dent for Franklin County Schools.”

L’Homme was praised at the BOE

SEE L’HOMME PAGE 10

FCS Superintendent Steps Down;

Nets Post In Nation’s Capital SEE LAB PAGE 7

Page 2 F C S F I R S T T H U R S D A Y M A Y , 2 0 0 9

Opportunity Knocks

O pening a school from scratch is an opportu-nity most principals

would like to receive. It’s a chance Long Mill Elementary School Principal Kim Ferrell has enjoyed this school year.

Ferrell’s opportunity didn’t happen overnight, but through 10 years of teaching at Bunn Elementary School, three years

as an assistant principal at Royal Elementary and four years as principal at Laurel Mill, she earned the experience needed to open Long Mill.

“Every step of my career has been a learning process, and I’ve taken something for all of the schools I’ve worked at,” Ferrell said. “Every school has been very valuable to me. At

Laurel Mill I had the chance to put everything together and op-erate a school. While I was there, I tried to get everyone on the same page and that took some changing of culture. I fig-ured if I could change a culture successfully, then I could de-velop one at Long Mill.”

Ferrell said she couldn’t ask

Long Mill Elementary School Principal Kim Ferrell still makes an effort to spend time with the students.

Principal Kim Ferrell Leading Long Mill

SEE LOMES PAGE 8


Head of the class

LHS Graduate Sets Pace At N.C. State

Jason King will graduate first in his class at N.C. State. He attributes much of his success to

his former teachers, such as former Terrell Lane Middle teacher Jackie McNamara (right).

O ne of the hardest things for a stu-dent to do is to figure out what path to pursue after graduating from high

school. It was not a hard decision for 2005 Louis-

burg High School graduate Jason King. King, who also designed the current Frank-lin County Schools logo, developed a pas-sion for computer programming and web design when he was attending Terrell Lane Middle School and has never looked back.

His passion and talent have already been proven as he prepares to graduate as Vale-dictorian in his class at North Carolina State University with a Bachelor of Science in

Computer Science and a minor in cognitive science.

King credits Franklin County Schools as a strong player in his success. From the tech-nology side, King is particular thankful for the efforts of technology facilitators Cathy Palmer and Mary Brantley and retired Ter-rell Lane teacher Jackie McNamara.

“I’m very thankful for every teacher I had,” King said. “My interest in technology started when I was in middle school and attended technology camp. The teachers and camps really motivated me for technology. The

SEE KING PAGE 15


Clutch Performers

Franklinton High School was well represented in the recent State Skills/USA competition in

Greensboro. Jonathan Hilliard (front left) captured first place for PowerPoint presentations, as

teammates Olivia Williams (front right) finished second in a poster board competition. Corey

Brushaber (back left) finished second in District Three for masonry and Pedro Najera (back right)

was fourth in District Three for masonry.

Skills/USA State Competition


FCS Students Net Teaching Fellows Scholarships Four Franklin County seniors were awarded North Carolina Teaching Fel-lows Scholarships in late March. Brianna Cooke and Krislyn-Kiara Tyler from Bunn High School along with Robert Bell from Franklin-ton High School and Cameron Gupton from Louisburg High School all earned the highly acclaimed scholar-ship for their outstanding perform-ance both in and out of the class-room. Just 500 students earn the award each year. The students were recognized by the Franklin County Board of Education on April 27th.

FHS Principal Charles Fuller (left) proudly stands with FHS’ senior

Robert Bell and Bell’s parents.

Bunn High Principal Robin Faulkner (left) is proud of Brianna Cooke

(green jacket) for earning a Teaching Fellows Scholarship. Brianna’s

family (right) was present during recognition of the award at a

Board of Education meeting.

Louisburg High School Prin-

cipal Freda Clifton (left)

can’t help but smile with

Cameron Gupton and his

family. Cameron is one of

four students from FCS to

receive a NC Teaching Fel-

lows Scholarship this year.


Liquid Nitrogen Ice Cream! Below, Terrell Lane Middle School stu-dents in Katie Tatum’s class visited NCSU to participate in NanoDays (below right). Students toured lab facili-ties on Centennial Campus and spoke with graduate students and professors regarding nanotechnology in addition to seeing several large microscopes used for viewing atoms and chemical structure. Students saw live images of ticks using powerful microscopes, and the students even got to see the tick's tongue! Students ended their lab tours with a stop at the Nano Ice Cream sta-tion. Where liquid nitrogen was used to make chocolate ice-cream.

Above, Terrell Lane Middle School students take

part in a tour of a walk-in cell. The annual exhibit

is a popular class project for students enrolled in

Katie Tatum’s class.


Board of Education meeting. Franklin County Schools Career

Technical Education Director Laureen Jones fueled the grant process.

“From my perspective, I was looking at the equipment needs for biotechnology and realized we needed a source of funds to up-grade the program. There is a need to recruit workers in that field. We had a program we were trying to launch, and we had the class at Vance-Granville. I was trying to find a way to pull all of the pieces together. Novozymes is the glue to hold it all together.

“We submitted a proposal to the team at Novozymes, and it went really well,” Jones said.

Taking part on that team was Novozymes Communications Man-ager Donnelly and IT Director Pot-ter. Donnelly said the team was excited about helping out a local school.

“It is a natural fit for the lab they are building and our company,” Donnelly said. “We were looking for a way to retarget our commu-nity relations program and have a science impact – this was perfect. It’s in our backyard. We’re pleased to help the school, and we hope to make a lasting impact. We want this relationship to continue, and we hope to have volunteers help-ing with the lab.”

Jones is equally excited about the opportunity.

“I was pleasantly surprised about the news,” Jones said. “This gives students an opportunity to look at biotechnology as a strong option. A student could have an opportu-nity to work right out of high school after taking this class. In addition, it prepares them for going on to programs at two-year schools and four-year universities.”

At Franklinton High School, Winn Clayton teaches introduction to biotechnology, while Joe Don Robertson teaches the biotechnol-ogy agri-science research class (Levels I and II). All students in the county can take the classes at Franklinton High School if space permits. In addition, all students may sign up for a biotechnology class at VGCC (Bio Processing Manufacturing) which is taught by Julie Kinlaw.

An additional grant (titled Picture Yourself in Biotechnology) was awarded from the North Carolina Biotechnology Center for the amount of $2,000. The smaller grant money will go toward the program housed at FHS.

In particularly, some of the funds will be used to market the program through informational commercials that will be produced through the digital media program, also housed at Franklinton High and taught by Michael Kearney.

- Nathan Moreschi

Franklin County Schools’ Career Technical Education Director Laureen Jones accepts $15,000 from Novozymes representatives Kevin Potter and Paige Donnelly during the April 27th Board of Education meeting.

LAB Continued from page 1


for a better teaching staff and lead-ership team.

“All of our teachers work very hard and are dedicated,” Ferrell said. “We are very fortunate. The leadership team is tremendous. We have the same focus.”

In addition to Ferrell, the Long Mill leadership team consists of assistant principal Carleen Jones, Curriculum Resource Teacher Lisa Fischer and school counselor Pat Dodson.

“They are all leaders,” Ferrell said “Pat does a wonderful job with helping the kids who struggle, and Lisa is tremendous with the data –

she’s really good at breaking it down and explaining it to us.

“There’s no way we could have opened the school without Car-leen. She’s very supportive and a hard worker. Before I can say I need something, she’s got it.

“I have an awesome staff. We built our mission together. It’s all about building relationships, 21st century learning and making our students globally competitive. Those are the three components of the Long Mill administration.”

The 2008 Franklin County Schools’ Principal of The Year graduated from East Wake High School and went on to earn a de-gree in elementary education from Fayetteville State University. She

began working as a teacher at Bunn Elementary in 1992 and earned her Masters in School Ad-ministration in 2002 from N.C. State University. That led to her post as an assistant principal at Royal, which preceded her first principal post at Laurel Mill.

“As a child, I always had an in-terest in teaching,” Ferrell said. “I taught Sunday School (growing up) and really liked it – so teaching just seemed natural.”

Ferrell’s desire to teach and pur-sue a career in education is also driven from the sudden passing of her aunt. When Ferrell was a child, her aunt, Carol Ferrell, unexpect-edly passed away during her sen-

LOMES

Kim Ferrell (left center) believes she is very fortunate to have a talented staff that includes (left to right) Ann Buckner

(secretary), assistant principal Carleen Jones, school counselor Pat Dodson, curriculum resource teacher Lisa Fischer and

data manager Joy Bass.

SEE ADMIN PAGE 9

F C S F I R S T T H U R S D A Y M A Y , 2 0 0 9 Page 9

ior year at Bennett College in Greensboro. Her aunt was chas-ing a teaching degree, but the dream was not reached, which added inspiration for Kim.

Ferrell praises many of the ad-ministrators who have helped her and continue to help her today. She was originally hired at Bunn Elementary by Principal Connie Horton and was mentored by cur-rent BES Principal Jewel Eason.

“Both of them really inspired me to advance my career,” Ferrell said. “Working with them was a wonderful experience – they really answered a lot of questions. Hav-ing Jewel as a mentor was the best thing that could happen to

me. I really learned a lot about the curriculum side of education.”

When she arrived at Royal, Ferrell got an opportunity to open a school with former principal Rob Bendel.

“At Royal, I learned a lot about managing a school,” Ferrell said. “Rob allowed me to do that. I learned how to deal with budgets and work effectively with staff.

“When I got to Laurel Mill, I was able to connect everything to-gether.”

Ferrell increased student achievement significantly at Lau-rel Mill but said that was an effect of the school coming together as a unit.

She also stated that one ele-ment that resulted in the school working collaboratively was the Whole Faculty Study Group pro-gram installed by Superintendent Dr. Bert L’Homme. That program served as a mechanism to en-courage teachers to work on spe-cific issues with a plan of action.

Ferrell is hoping for continued success in terms of student achievement at Long Mill. While the school has not been through a round of end-of-grade state test-ing, she’s confident about this year.

“I know our teachers are doing the right things,” Ferrell said. “I think we will be OK. We’ve looked at our benchmarks, and we are making progress.”

From the beginning, Ferrell has expressed the importance of com-munity involvement. Ferrell is ex-tremely pleased with the level of parent involvement thus far. She

praised the Parent Teacher Or-ganization (PTO) for its continued support and valuable input.

The first official school event was a community night held in August of last year and was a big success. That was followed by an equally successful open house that jammed the parking lot full of cars and excited parents.

Ferrell believes that involvement helps keep the staff motivated.

Another program that is appar-ently working well for Long Mill is the Student Wellness program.

“We want our students to be healthy,” Ferrell said. “Research shows that healthy students per-form better.”

Among the activities designed to promote healthy students are the early morning exercise program, presentations and healthy food programs through the cafeteria.

The early-early morning exer-cise program is a huge success, as hundreds of students enter the gym to get a pep-start to the day. Administrators take part as well.

Ferrell was recently one of a few FCS educators who were in-ducted into the Delta Kappa Edu-cation Society.

“It’s an honor to be a part of this organization – there are so many talented educators in it.”

When not involved with school work, Ferrell is out watching her 9-year-old daughter grow up. Her daughter is involved in church, dance and other activities.

- Nathan Moreschi

Kim Ferrell spends a little time dis-

cussing technology with a student.

ADMIN Continued from page 8


L’Homme Continued from page 1

meeting when he announced his future plans.

“I’m very excited for him,” BOE Chair Paige Sayles said. “To have a national organization re-cruit someone from a small county really says a lot. This speaks volumes about Dr. L’Homme’s ability. We’ve had him for five years, and we’ve been able to steadily grow academi-cally. We’ve also progressed as a system in terms of technology, and we are reaching goals asso-ciated with 21st century learning skills.”

BOE member John May stated that while many buildings were constructed and facilities were upgraded during L’Homme’s time, there was something more impor-tant he should be remembered for.

“He wanted students to learn more and do better on tests – and the numbers have gotten better. Dr. L’Homme had his sights set on the right things and I thank him for that. I hate to see you go.”

L’Homme began his career in education in D.C. as a special education teacher working with disturbed students. After spend-ing considerable time in the class-room, he earned a job as princi-pal of City Lights School. City Lights was a school dedicated to disturbed and delinquent adoles-cence.

“Having started out working in

D.C. with children who were trou-bled and now going back to work on a project with the Children’s Defense Fund is exciting.”

While the biggest component of the job is related to policy, the Cradle to Prison Pipeline Crusade is key factor for L’Homme.

The project is designed to res-cue children who are at high-risk of heading down the path of delin-quency and prison. The project focuses on giving young children the resources necessary to be successful and launched into adulthood with real choices such as employment training or col-lege.

The project fits well with L’Homme’s passion to help stu-dents stay in school.

“I take it personally when a stu-dent drops out of school, not just in Franklin County, but wherever I

worked as an educator.” That same compassion helped

lead to academic programs within the classroom that help lead to higher student achievement.

“I’m particularly proud of our literacy and mathematics pro-grams at elementary and middle schools,” L’Homme said. “I’m also pleased with the turnaround pro-gram at the high schools.”

L’Homme also added positive comments about the success of professional learning communi-ties, also known as Whole Faculty Study Groups. After a rocky start with the program, L’Homme said the process gained acceptance as the years progressed, and he was happy to see such good re-sults over the past couple of years.

Superintendent Dr. Bert L’Homme made a point to stay in contact with staff

throughout his five-year stay with FCS.

SEE L’HOMME PAGE 11


For people who live in Franklin County, progress during L’Homme’s tenure is visible through construction. During his more than five-year stay, major construction projects, including a new school with Long Mill Ele-mentary, were completed. In ad-dition, there were major construc-tion projects at all three high schools.

“But what I really want to be remembered for is not losing site of all students. I’ve always wanted people to believe my door was really always open. I believe I was successful at this. From students, teachers, staff to mem-bers of the community, they were always welcome to come sit and talk with me - and they did.

“I’m going to miss the talented and dedicated teachers, princi-pals and most especially the stu-dents I got to work with.”

- Nathan Moreschi

L’Homme Continued from page 10

Soil and Water Conservation

District Awards Held On Thursday, April 23, the Frank-

lin Soil & Water Conservation Dis-trict held the 13th Annual Awards Program at Terrell Lane Middle School. District Board member Charles Mitchell recognized forty three talented students in third through fifth grades who won cash prizes for their contributions to the District’s Annual Poster contest. This year’s contest theme was “Soil & Water – Yours for Life”. Partici-pants were required to design a poster highlighting the contest theme while adhering to specific rules and guidelines set forth by the NC Association of Conservation Districts. Posters are judged lo-cally before they can be entered into the area and state competi-tions. The Franklin Soil & Water Conservation District awarded cash prizes and certificates and ribbons to the first, second and third place winners in each school. Fifty dollar gift certificates from Wal-Mart were awarded to the overall county win-ners. All winning entries in the county competition were sent to Granville County for the Area IV competition, where they competed against first place winners from eleven surrounding counties.

School winners who received prizes at the program were: Whit-ney Bolton, Alexandria Cardwell, Jorge Hinostrosa, Joanna Myatt, Allison Barlow, Sebastian Parrish, Lelia Connor, Caroline McGhee, Autumn Basnett, Lucy Collins, Asia Strickland, Jodie Summerlin, Chan-dler Broughton, Amanda Dean, Edward Denton, Victoria Poyer, Dylan Hudson, Emily Bumgarner, Alexis Salter, Melyssa Dawson,

Marissa Daniels, Ileana Wilder, Brendan Connors, Madisyn Sapp, Caleb Lane, Arianne Lamont, Yenni Rebollar, Amanda Green, Johnathan Martin, Owen Faulkner, Taylor Shepardson, Christianna Allen, Nicholas Tart, Kaylee De-ment, Gabriella Hilliard, Stephanie Sample, Belen Estrada, Haley Jones, Karene Anderson, Raechel Robinson, Kristen Senter, Haley Williams and Brooke Moore.

Three students were announced as first place county winners and received a $50.00 Wal-Mart gift card in addition to the school prize. Those students were Joanna Myatt, third grader at Edward Best Elementary; Chandler Broughton, a fourth grader also from Edward Best Elementary; and Kristen Senter, a fifth grade student at Franklinton Elementary. Chandler and Kristen could not attend and received their prizes at school.

Also during the program the Dis-trict announced that one student won additional honors in the Area IV Poster Contest. Joanna Myatt competed against students from Wake, Warren, Johnston, Granville, Halifax, Durham, Vance, Wilson, Edgecombe and Nash counties and was selected as the second place Area IV winner for her grade. She received an additional check for $50.00.

For additional information con-cerning this event, please contact Cindy Phelps, Franklin County Soil and Water Conservation at (919) 496-3137. Additional contact num-bers can be obtained by visiting Franklin County’s website at www.co.franklin.nc.us.


Bunn High Hoops Player

Invited To National Event Bunn High School junior basketball player Michael

Collins has been invited to play in the USA Junior Nation-als International Sports Festival from July 27th through August 2.

Collins was selected based on his strong performance in the USA Junior Nationals high school basketball com-petition held in Greensboro this spring. Students from more than 40 states will participate.

The highly acclaimed event will take places in Cham-paign on the campus of the University of Illinois.

Bunn Middle School teacher Kristen Hensley has been se-lected by the Kenan Fellows Pro-gram for Curriculum and Leader-ship Development at North Caro-lina State University as a Class of 2011 Kenan Fellow. Beginning in June, 2009, she will engage in a two-year fellowship supported by the Goodnight Educational Foun-dation to develop innovative cur-ricula for use in North Carolina classrooms while working with mentors Ashley Weinard and Jill Taylor from the NC Museum of Art. Her project is entitled “Art of Collaboration.”

As part of the two-year fellow-ship, Hensley will train to be a master teacher, work closely with her mentors in developing her pro-

ject, participate in research to de-velop inquiry-guided instruction to be used in the classroom, develop and distribute her lessons state-wide, talk with state leaders at events that promote the teaching profession, train to be a teacher leader and present findings at state and national conferences.

Hensley is a Science / Social Studies / Sixth Grade teacher at Bunn Middle School in Bunn, NC. She is a National Board Certified teacher and has received grants from APPSCUR and the United Way Foundation of Franklin County. She has made presenta-tions at the National Council of Teachers of English Conference and the International Conference on Service-Learning in Teacher

Education (Brussels, Belgium). Kenan Fellows Program: The Kenan Fellows Program is

an initiative of the Kenan Institute for Engineering, Technology & Science at North Carolina State University. It is an innovative model to promote teacher leader-ship, address teacher retention and advance K-12 science, tech-nology, engineering and mathe-matics education. Kenan Fellows are public school teachers se-lected through a competitive proc-ess to participate in a prestigious two-year fellowship, all while re-maining active in the classroom. Read more about the Kenan Fel-lows Program at www.kenanfellows.org.

BMS Teacher selected to Kenan Fellows Program


Members of Expresion Latina, the Latin American culture club at FHS, worked together to donate and assemble personal care items for ESL families ar-riving at the International Center of Franklin County. The students liked the idea of giving personal items to the families that would be useful to them when they arrive in Franklin County and often do not have necessities that most of us take for granted.

They were interested in knowing more about the families, such as how many of them have children, what kind of work they do, and where they lived be-fore arriving here.

The Expresion Latina students were supported in this endeavor by the Spanish I classes at FHS who also donated generously of personal care items: soap, shampoo, conditioner, toothbrushes, tooth-paste, washcloths, combs, brushes, and socks.

Minnie Shirey from the International Center came on April 9 to FHS to pick up the rescue kits and talk

with the Expresion Latina students. She provided information about the Center and how they reach out to migrant families who work hard and have particular needs for their children. She described the work they do and how difficult it can be for young people of those families who move often with the agricultural cycle.

Ms. Shirey told the students their donations were very helpful and would be very much appreciated by the International Center staff and the families who will be arriving here in Franklin County.

Some students were asking if they could do this project again that they appreciated the opportunity to do something positive for their community. And it was fun (muy divertido!)

- Yvonne Townsley Sponsor

Franklinton High School students recently participated in a donation drive of personal care items for ESL families arriving

at the FCS International Center.

Helping Hands of FHS

Caring Students Pitch In, Help Families Adjust


The Reverend Dannie T. Wil-liams, Franklin County Board of Education's Vice - Chair, recently celebrated his 13th anniversary as Senior Pastor of the Melfield United Church of Christ in Mebane NC.

Reverend Williams has been in ministry for 34 years and has men-tored more than 30 ministers dur-ing his ministerial career.

He is the principal of the North Edgecombe High School in Edge-combe county and is active in community and civic organiza-tions as well as his present pur-suit of a doctorate of education degree (ED D) at NC State Univer-sity. He is married to Regina Davis-Williams who is the media specialist at Franklinton High and has four children and one grand-daughter.

BOE Vice Chair Honored for Continued Service

FES Events

Franklinton Elementary students and staff have

been quite busy in recent months taking part in a

variety of different events. At left, a FES student

participates in a water safety demonstration pro-

vided by Falls Lake. The event stressed the im-

portance of being safe when swimming and boat-

ing and how to save someone who is drowning.

There were separate events for children in

grades K-2 and 3-5.

At right, Franklinton Elementary School

volunteers receive a much deserved

luncheon of appreciation for their hard

work and dedication to the school. FES,

like many other schools, is in the proc-

ess of gearing up for End-Of-Grade

tests.


Franklin County Schools technol-ogy camps (Hyperstudio and LEGO robotics) helped convince me to venture into computer technologies in college.”

Palmer has fond memories of King and distinctly remembers her first encounter with him as a stu-dent.

“When Jason was at TLMS, I went over to help the webmaster one afternoon,” Palmer said. “That is when I found out that Jason was playing a large part in the design of their webpage. To this day, I am still flabbergasted that this young middle school student taught him-self how to code HTML to create the TLMS webpage. Ever since then, for as long as he was in our school system, he continued to challenge me to push my limits by doing things with web pages that caused me to have to increase my skills in order to accommodate his web design aspirations. On several occasions, I have turned to Jason for help, and he has always re-sponded professionally and with clear instructions, even after he became a student at NCSU. Jason is a fine young man, not only gifted, talented and highly intelligent, but I have also found him to be a truly caring person that I am proud to know as he becomes an adult.”

McNamara was equally im-pressed with King as a student. He attributes his programming lan-guage interest to McNamara letting him borrow a Quick Basic book.

“Mrs. McNamara loaned me the

book, and I developed a feel for programming. I’m very thankful for that.”

McNamara, much like Palmer, believes King is truly special.

“He was a wonderful student,” McNamara said. “He would do whatever you asked him to do and more. He was interested in pro-gramming and I really wanted to help him, so I brought him the book. He got it very quickly. I’ve never had a student like him – I just can’t say enough about him.”

McNamara was honored when King invited her to his senior pro-ject presentation at NCSU. King worked on a point of sale based project at Fujitsu in Wake Forest.

Palmer maintains contact with King and still smiles when his named is mentioned.

“Every year, I am impressed with the projects and achievements he has made,” Palmer said. “This year, when I learned he is to be Valedictorian, I felt so proud. I know I had very little to do with his success, but perhaps I did have something to do with the direction his education has taken, and that makes me extremely proud. In his most recent letter, he talked about the influence that summer technol-ogy camps had on his career path. As an educator, I know that I influ-ence the lives of my students, but it is far too rare for a student to ex-press to a teacher his appreciation for making a difference in his/her life. When I read his words of ac-knowledgement for both myself and Mrs. Brantley and how we influ-enced his educational direction, I took off my glasses, grabbed a tis-sue, and just let the tears fall. I treasure his words, and they will be

framed and placed prominently in my office by the end of the week.”

King isn’t going to stop after graduating. He plans on continuing his education at NCSU next fall to work on earning a Masters in Com-puter Science.

Although he has a true love for the field, he admits it wasn’t the easiest of times during his NCSU career.

“My sophomore year I thought about changing majors, but I de-cided to stick with it. Classes were tough that year, but luckily it got a lot better after that,” King said.

Brantley had this to offer about King’s accomplishment.

“It’s really cool,” Brantley said. “I remember when he came to camp. He was not even sure he was go-ing to college. By the end of camp, he was saying he was going to be a programmer. I remember he was doing things that nobody else in camp had done before. It was cool to watch him get excited about it. This is what we are here for. This is what you love to see. It’s not un-usual for kids to succeed, but to have them tell you about it makes it really neat.”

As far as a long-range plan, King had this to say.

“Right now I’m kind of open to anything. I want to get a feel for what it is all about. NCSU is a great place to be for this.”

With the passion, knowhow and a current 4.0 GPA, King will probably have little difficulty landing a ca-reer.

- Nathan Moreschi

KING Continued from page 3

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