Thomas County Central High School senior Claire Pope videoed her way to a special scholarship during this summer’s annual Electric Cooperative Youth Tour, otherwise known as the Washington Youth Tour.
Grady EMC chose Pope as its representative for this year’s tour. Her group – featuring Pope and two student delegates from other areas – won $5,000 scholarships (one for each member) in the tour’s Video Challenge Scholarship Competition.
“Winning this scholarship means so much to me because my community is so important to me,” Pope said. “I was very surprised when I found out that I had won the scholarship. I knew I had great partners and that we had a great video, but I had no idea what the other groups had come up with. We received little direction so that we would be able to get creative, so every group had something different.”
The challenge’s prompt was as follows: “What did you learn during the Youth Tour that will be useful to you in the future? How do you feel knowing that your local EMC invested in developing your leadership skills through this program, and why do you think it is important for your EMC to invest in young people?”
In an event press release, Public Relations Representative Kaleb Frady explained the judging process.
“To determine a winner, each of our seven judges ranked the seven groups that submitted videos in order of their preference 1-7,” Frady said. “From there we assigned each judge’s top choice seven points, the second choice six points, and so on. The group with the most points was declared the winner.”
Pope’s group produced a video about building community and creating unity in their hometowns. Her partners live in the Atlanta area, so everyone returned home and asked residents to write a single word on a whiteboard that described how they felt they impacted their community. Then, the group recorded video footage of these residents stating their words and providing a brief explanation of what it meant to them.
“Many people struggled to come up with a word because they did not feel like they individually had an impact on the community as a whole,” Pope said. “The purpose of going out and getting everyone involved was to show that every person plays a significant role in creating a great community, even when they do not see it. As people began to think about what they could write as their word, they began to realize all of the great things that they do for others within the community.”
As for the tour itself, Pope and her fellow delegates attended virtually this year, thanks to COVID-19’s continued threat. She Zoomed with various state government officials, including Sen. Raphael Warnock, over the three-day virtual event.
“This was a great experience, and we were still able to hear all of the amazing speakers that we would have heard if we were actually in Washington D.C.,” Pope said. “I learned many valuable lessons from the Washington Youth Tour and enjoyed being able to interact with students across Georgia. Even though it was a virtual tour, I think that each student in attendance values the experience and will remember it for years to come. I am so grateful for all of the opportunities that youth tour provided for me.”
Currently a senior, Pope hopes to attend the University of Georgia and study history. After earning her degree, she plans to become a museum curator.
“We are so happy Claire had the opportunity through Grady EMC to experience the Georgia EMC Youth Tour in its current form,” TCCHS Assistant Principal Jim Rehberg said. “The speakers and activities were high-interest and no doubt very valuable for any young leader. And she earned an awesome scholarship toward her future endeavors that I'm sure made Claire and her parents very happy.”