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"'Guts, Nobility and Love of Family'"
"By Andrea WoodPOLAND, Ohio -- A future TV anchorman, the next recording star, two computer engineers, a nurse and a lucrative business career. The dreams of six high school seniors are likely to come true thanks to the Edward J. DeBartolo Memorial Scholarship Foundation."By awarding a grant to me, you are planting a seed of success in the low-income community," said Andriel Johnson as she thanked Denise DeBartolo-York and the scholarship foundation she established in memory of her father for making it possible for her to attend college.Johnson was one of six students who received a $5,000 grant from the foundation to defray first-year college expenses. "Without this grant, I don't know how I'd get into college," she said at an awards ceremony and luncheon held Thursday at the Poland Village Library.Johnson, a senior at Warren Harding High School, plans to pursue a music degree and dreams of one day becoming a recording artist. Her dream began, she said, when she was a little girl. "I remember when my fourth grade teacher, Miss Duncan, looked into my eyes and said I was going to be a star," she recalled. Her teacher's inspiration -- and confidence in her abilities -- fortified her determination to excel at her studies and extra-curricular activities, which ultimately resulted in the scholarship award, she said. In the last nine years, the Edward J. DeBartolo Memorial Scholarship Foundation has awarded more than $275,000 in scholarships. "My father believed that all students who have demonstrated intensity and desire, regardless of their financial situation, should be afforded the opportunity to receive a college education," DeBartolo-York said.As DeBartolo-York introduced each of the grant recipients, she explained why they were selected. One-by-one, the recipients acknowledged the support of family members and their most influential teacher, who they lauded for inspiring them to reach for their dreams.For Tsukasa Harrington, who came to America from Japan in 1999, his inspiration came from the eighth grade English teacher who worked with him after school to teach him the language of his new country. Harrington, a senior at Hubbard High School, will graduate at the top of his class. For Amber Rummel, a senior at East Palestine High School who will pursue a nursing career, her inspiration came from her math teacher, who insisted she could solve the toughest problems. "Even though she's my math teacher, she's still my friend," Rummel remarked, which brought smiles to the faces of others who endured high school calculus. William A. Sadler, a senior at Cardinal Mooney High School in Youngstown -- the future TV anchorman -- related how he set his cap on earning a DeBartolo scholarship when he was a freshman, and worked hard to achieve his goal.Donald J. Hermes, a senior at Poland Seminary High School who will study computer science at Youngstown State University, recognized Jamie Dunn, his social studies teacher. With Dunn's inspiration, Hermes said, "I kicked it up a notch, and went from getting B's to A's."Kevin Kelsey, a senior at Lordstown High School who plans to pursue a degree in computer engineering, thanked his school's principal as he emphasized the significance of the DeBartolo scholarship. "My family doesn't have much money. It's tough for us to get by some times," he said."Edward J. DeBartolo always felt education was the route to take people out of poverty and places of prejudice and into the mainstream of society," said John York, president of the Boardman-based DeBartolo Corp. In telling the scholarship recipients about his father-in-law, who died in 1995, York detailed how DeBartolo worked his way through the University of Notre Dame. "He was a man of vision," he said. "He went from building houses to building strip centers. He built Market Street out to Boardman. He built the Boardman Plaza, the Southern Park Mall, and 80 shopping centers across the country."A video biography of DeBartolo told more the man the scholarship foundation honors, his determination to get an education and his work ethic that meant 14-hour days, seven days a week. The developer was seen speaking on the video to a reporter. "If I've been successful, it's that I never took a backward step," he said."If he were here today," he would tell you this is the first step of your adult life and to take advantage -- which I think you will -- of every opportunity that crosses your path," DeBartolo-York said. "Each of you embody what was so important in my father's life: guts, nobility and love of family."More than 350 seniors applied for the scholarship grants, and the awards committee worked with 48 guidance counselors to select this year's recipients. Joyce Pishkur of East Palestine High School was honored with the foundation's first guidance-counselor-of-the-year-award. Pishkur meets with every student at East Palestine High School three times over the course of his or her senior year, DeBartolo-York noted."After 30 years in the field of education, this is probably the first time I've ever been recognized for doing my job," Pishkur said.Contact Andrea Wood at [email protected]"