Thirty students from the Tacoma Public Schools (TPS) earned a varsity letter in community service in partnership with United Way of Pierce County at the recent awards ceremony with Gov. Christine Gregoire, who presented the varsity letters. These TPS students are part of an elite group of 222 devoted high school volunteers from 31 high schools and 16 public school districts, and they averaged 235 hours of community service each.
Pierce County is the only county in the United States with this kind of broad participation by high schools and school districts in a community service/varsity letter program, according to Bethany Opstedal, Youth United program manager with United Way of Pierce County.
To earn a varsity letter, students must meet high baseline standards. The award is open to any Pierce County student in grades 9–12 who completes at least 145 hours of volunteer service. These hours are above and beyond school requirements and the timeframe for volunteer work is April 1 to March 31 of each school year. Students’ volunteer time must include activities both related to the school community and the community-at-large. United Way of Pierce County, with the help of many citizen volunteers, verifies 100 percent of all the documented volunteer work before issuing a varsity letter on behalf of a student’s school.
Tacoma Public Schools recipients were:
Foss High School
Jinkyong Lee
Brittany Bonning
Sae Rom Kim
Ngan Vu
Ngoc-Han Vu
Sara Yun
Chi Le
Lincoln High School
John Wing
Mt. Tahoma High School
Cindy Williams
Ashley Finch
Valyncia Green
Corbin Richmond
Stadium High School
Tiffany Frownfelter
Megan Lockert
Agnes Song
Myranda Morris
Katie Ballantyne
Wilson High School
Alexander Erickson
Hyeyoung Lee
Tacoma School of the Arts
Jake Stortini
Stephanie Reynolds
Savanna Shores
Briana Sims
Jasmine Gruensstein
Trevon Garcia
Phillysha Cottrell
Linnea Vargas
Sierra Wilmott
Maria Gorbaty
Zachary Lavine