Columbia County Newsmakers
Course completed
Lessie M. Chapman of Evans recently completed accredited specialty course work from the University of Florida in association with MediPro Seminars, LLC, in life care planning and related catastrophic case management.
Chapman has a Master of Science in nursing from the Medical College of Georgia and is board-certified as an advanced practice nurse in psychiatric nursing. She recently was certified as a certified life care planner by the Commission on Health Care Certification. She is one of 33 professionals certified as CLCP in Georgia and the only one certified in the Augusta area.
Chapman is the founder and president of L&G Consulting Inc. in Evans.
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Augusta State grads
Honor chorus:
Martinez Elementary fifth-graders Allison Vick (from left), Ryan Oellerich and Hannah Starnes recently participated in the Statewide Elementary Honor Chorus. In this all-state event, elementary-school singers come together to form two choruses of about 250 pupils each, and work with prominent choral conductors as they prepare for their concert. Choral conductors Charles Tighe and Alyssa Gangarosa Coble are shown with the pupils.
Special
Nearly 360 students took part in Augusta State University's fall commencement Dec. 6. Graduates from Appling included Kenneth Wayne Glaze Jr., Joseph Brian Morris, Courtney Anne Robertson and David A. Thibodeau. Grovetown graduates were Sheryl Dyanne Lewis, Chase Farris Caldwell, Melissa Ann Cassada, Donna Jo Collier, Joshua Lynn Crouch, Rita Elisa Deuber, Randall Todd Dunaway, Kierston D. Eicke, Philip C. Fernandez, Gerry A. Hall, Diana Lynn Hamilton, Amanda Lynn Heath, Clinton E. Hubbard, Hyon Chol Ko, Jose Antonio Rivera, Ryan Seymour, Rachel Stubblefield and Timothy John Walls. Participating Evans students were Steven E. Hobelman, Sharon Murphy, Jennifer Gayle Howard, Bruce Lewis Kaplan, Julie V. Morkve, Warren Gause Morris, Amit Nanda, Marvalisa M. Payne, Theresa Jeanne Petty John, Yvonne Young Pouncey, Amanda E. Ramsey, Lisa Krueger Reeder, Richard L. Rogers Jr., Allan K. Runner, Anil Sharma, Sunaree Tanmanatragul, Macon Easterling Warren, Christopher Paul Wheelin, Lillian Christine Wilson and David L. Wooten III. Harlem graduates include Cheryl Marie Bain, Matthew Stuart Barron, Tara Wilkes Cooper, Amanda M. Davidson, Pamela Antoinette Faison and Jarthurlynn Martina Harris.
Scholarship winner
Dabeney A. Peters of Martinez, a senior social work major at Elizabethtown College, received the Henry Janssen Foundation Scholarship.
Ranked consistently as one of the country's best small comprehensive colleges, Elizabethtown College educates nearly 1,800 men and women for service through an academic offering of 43 undergraduate majors. The college, founded in 1899, is in Lancaster County near Hershey, Pa.
Wilson Fellow
Kenneth Kay Jr., a Johns Hopkins University sophomore from Martinez, has been selected as one of the university's Woodrow Wilson Fellows, a group of students who focus on ongoing research and scholarship while still in their undergraduate years.
Kay is the son of Ken and Nora Kay of Martinez, and attended Lakeside High School.
Wilson Fellows work with faculty mentors and receive research funding to cover travel, equipment or other related costs for four years. They will participate in a senior-year seminar in which their original work will be analyzed as part of a discussion of the major intellectual questions in their field.
Kay intends to focus his research on necromodulatory determinants of associative synaptic plasticity.
AP Scholars
Five Augusta Christian Schools students have been named AP Scholars by the College Board for their exceptional achievement on the college-level Advanced Placement Program exams.
The College Board's Advanced Placement Program offers students the opportunity to take challenging college-level courses while still in high school, and to receive college credit, advanced placement or both for successful performance on the AP exams.
The AP Scholars from Augusta Christian are graduating class of 2003 students: John Allen Beckman, Marcus Smith, and Erin Swearingen. Current Augusta Christian seniors Jessica Faulkner and Jean Lopez also were named AP Scholars. Students took the exams in May after completing college-level courses at their high schools.
Teacher certified
Riverside Elementary School teacher DeeAnne Varnadoe has been awarded the Reading Renaissance Model Classroom Recertification by the Madison, Wis., company.
To receive certification, a teacher must show their students receive a minimum 60 minutes of reading practice time daily. Teachers must also work with individual students to meet achievement standards.