Falls student wins annual MLK award

http://www.niagara-gazette.com/local...004204936.html


(Kennia Adams is the winner of the Niagara Falls School District’s annual Civil Rights Youth Achievement Award and will honored at the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Community Celebration on Jan. 21. )

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Kennia Adams honored for strong work ethic, leadership
By Dan Miner/minerd@gnnewspaper.com
Niagara Gazette

Kennia Adams isn’t an in-your-face type of teenager. Nor is she boisterous or especially loud.

But the avid track athlete, a senior at Niagara Falls High School, commands so much respect from her teachers and peers that she was chosen as the winner of the district’s annual Civil Rights Youth Achievement Award.

“She’s a very understated, a strong but quiet young lady,” said Mark Laurrie, the high school’s chief education administrator. “But she’s always doing the right thing, which attracts other kids to want to be like her and be near her. She leads by her choices and examples.”

This will be the second year the annual award is given. Adams will be honored at the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Community Celebration on Jan. 21. Assemblywoman Francine DelMonte, D-Niagara Falls, William Williamson and Salvatore Constantino will also receive awards.

Adams said that Laurrie told her of the award one day after track practice.

“I was very excited and surprised,” she said.

She’s extensively involved in the school’s indoor and outdoor track programs, serving as a team captain. Adams and another female student were catalysts behind the school’s decision to start an indoor girls track program, Laurrie said. She’s also involved in The Wolverine Club and the cross-country running program.

Adams said her main out-of-school pleasures are shopping at the mall and hanging out with friends — all of whom share her desire to stay away from drugs and alcohol.

“I don’t want to take the risk of getting in trouble,” she said. “I don’t like having any nonsense around.”

Her parents, Darlene Ross and Kenny Adams, were important influences in keeping her on the straight and narrow.

“They decided to keep me away from stuff like that,” she said. “They’ve supported me through everything and always encouraged me to do well in school and in track.”

Adams lives with her sister, 12-year-old Jasmine Ross, and brother, 16-year-old Darius Sikes, and has two more brothers and a sister who don’t live with her. She has been dating her boyfriend, 18-year-old Falls student Mannie Lewis, for two years. After graduation she plans to attend Penn State University to study psychology.

The award will be presented to Adams by one of her friends and last year’s award winner, Vance Adamson, who said he’s known Adams for almost three years.

“She’s very caring,” he said. “She’s a smart girl, and she’s kind of shy. I’ve never seen her angry.”

Students are chosen for the award by both teacher’s and the school’s student council, said Margaret Kaiser, executive director of the Arts in Education Institute of Western New York, which has an office in the high school and helped form the awards. They are meant to honor students whose values would embody those of Martin Luther King Jr.