Top students bound by kindness

Even more than the academic and extracurricular accolades one comes to expect, a common theme among all three Lincoln Parish Schools district wide Students of the Year rises to the top: kindness.

On Jan. 13, the school district crowned A. E. Phillips Laboratory School’s Preston Parker and Chad Hamlin as elementary and middle school Students of the Year, respectively, and named Ruston High School’s Amanda Meng Student of the Year at the high school level.

All three boast a bevy of achievements, but when asked what drives them, each honoree cited a desire to spread kindness as one of their top sources of motivation.

Preston Parker and Chad Hamlin

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Elementary Student of the Year Preston Parker is pictured participating in one of his many extracurricular activities: running cross country.

Schoolmates Parker and Hamlin like to express themselves.

Parker, 11, does so in many ways: he swims, runs cross country, performs in theatre, and participates in church activities. He also has a particular fondness for music.

“I like playing music because it helps me express my feelings,” he said.

“There’s a song for every way that you’re feeling,” Parker said. “It’s fun to learn all the different ways you can play.”

Meanwhile, Hamlin’s self-expression comes through art, including sketches of people and characters that he works hard to bring to life.

“I really enjoy doing artistic things,” he said. “It makes me feel very peaceful. You can really discover who people are through the way they express themselves, and I feel like art just makes that a little clearer.”

These students’ interests are far from purely inward-focused, however. Parker uses his piano skills to entertain residents at nursing homes. He also has a heart for the homeless people of the Ruston area. Just this week he made “mana bags” full of nonperishable necessities like towels and water bottles and passed them out to his classmates “to give to people who are homeless on the side of the road.”

“We are so blessed, and we should help the people who are not as blessed and give them blessings,” Parker said.

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Middle School Student of the Year Chad Hamlin, left, is pitured riding in the CenturyNext Bank Mardi Gras float with his mother, Lorie Hamlin, and brother Jordan Hamlin.

Parker and Hamlin are both active in cleaning up litter in their neighborhoods and spreading awareness of the litter issue they see in the area.

“The way I was raised is to always present yourself the best you can and be the best you are,” Hamlin said. “When we invite guests to our house, we want it to be clean. So I feel like as a country and as a world, we should want to present ourselves as clean and responsible and not just throw trash away where it doesn’t need to be.”

Both of AEP’s Students of the Year are in the gifted program and have achieved top marks on standardized testing. But Hamlin, who also garnered district Student of the Year honors three years ago as a fifth grader, said nothing is more important to him than spreading hope and kindness as far as he possibly can. One way he hopes to do that is by encouraging others his age to interact more deeply away from social media and electronic devices.

“A lot of people are always stuck on their phones, but we’re born with the need for human interaction,” he said. “If we could all come together and talk with one another, we could understand each other a little more. It could help solve some of the racial and political challenges we face in the world. More people need to stand up instead of just typing something on the internet and hiding behind their phones.”

AEP Director Jenny Blaylock said every day is evidence that both Parker and Hamlin live out the ideas they talk about.

“Both of them are extremely kind to all their teachers and classmates, not just their friend groups,” Blaylock said. “They’re both very joyful and always smiling. When I think of Preston, I think of kindness, and when I think of Chad, I think of kindness.”

Amanda Meng

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High School Student of the Year Amanda Meng, right, is shown at Ruston High FBLA's community service presentation to the Louisiana Methodist Children's Home in 2018, one of her many community service activities. At left is the LMCH's Casey Morace.

A brief glance at Meng’s list of achievements and responsibilities includes a GPA above 4.0, a perfect 36 on the ACT, president of the RHS chapter of Future Business Leaders of America, and editor-in-chief of the school newspaper Chatterbox.

Meng said the reasons she is motivated to try her hardest and excel in every area began before she was born. Immigrants from China, her parents moved to America in the hopes that doing so would open up their family to more opportunities to succeed. Meng said that decision and every investment made into her life since then are what keep her going full speed.

“I know that I’m lucky to have this opportunity to go to such an amazing school and have such amazing people support me, and I know that I have to make the most of it,” she said. “I don’t want to waste it, because I know my parents came here for that reason. I don’t want to waste everything they and other people have given me.”

As a daughter of immigrants, Meng said she is aware of the many differences between people, but she believes everyone should be treated with the same kindness. That’s why among her activities is a long list of community service.

“Everyone deserves kindness, so if you have the opportunity to help other people, you should,” she said.

One way she hopes to do that in the future is by entering the field of medicine and eventually contributing to cancer research. Her cousin died from cancer when she was young, and her uncle is still battling it today.

“Your health is something that’s really important to you, so when I get older I want to be able to help alleviate people’s sufferings in that way, because I know firsthand how hard it is for them and for the people watching them go through it,” Meng said.

Senior adviser Kay White said Meng’s time management stands out as a key factor in her achievement.

“She is very goal-oriented and responsible,” White said. “When you look at her resume, you ask yourself, ‘When doe she even have time to study?’ She manages her time very well, and I think that’s the key to her success.”

Meng credits her experience with FBLA for enhancing her time management and job skills, as well as providing more opportunities for community service. She credits Chatterbox with teaching her the importance of teamwork.

As she approaches graduation, Meng said she hopes her life can be one that is marked treating others how she would want to be treated.

“America has a lot of different cultures coming in,” she said. “People have a lot of differences between them, but in the end those shouldn’t matter — we should all be treated with kindness.”