By Gary Lloyd
PINSON — Winners have been named from the sixth annual Pinson Education Foundation banquet, held Monday.
The Student of the Year award was won by Bria Dial. Dale Ingram won Pinson Elementary Teacher of the Year, Allyson Sealy won Kermit Johnson Elementary Teacher of the Year, Pamela Bowman won Rudd Middle School Teacher of the Year and Erin DeArman was named Pinson Valley High School Teacher of the Year. Support Staff Member of the Year was won by Karen Mardis.
Runners-up for the Student of the Year award were Hannah Trucks, Luke Hyche, Elijah Bibbs and Austin Wynn.
Character winners from the sixth grade were Eziyah Bishop and Michael Stewart. Faith Potter and Nolan Couch were character winners from seventh grade, Daisy Mount and Matthew Nance were character winners from eighth grade, and Caleb O’Toole and Kyra Hunter were freshman character winners. Sophomore character winners were Bret Coleman and Aaron Brown, and junior character winners were Justin Adam Crocker, Hannah Peoples and Kirbi Tuck.
Pinson Education Foundation Executive Director Joe Cochran said “this is truly a great community event that reflects the strong character of Pinson and its citizens.”
The Pinson Valley High School Chamber Choir performed at Monday’s event. The basketball team helped set up, the football team cleaned up and the cheerleaders served dinner. Around 200 people attended.
The awards handed out totaled $4,750. Rick Journey was the event’s featured speaker, talking about issues facing teachers and students, as well as those that made a difference in his life in school.
Some from Clay and Locust Fork were also in attendance to see how things work at the Pinson Education Foundation, Cochran said.
“I hope we can help spread this around to surrounding communities, and we are here to answer questions and assist in any way possible,” he said.
For more information, visit www.pinsoneducationfoundation.org.
Contact Gary Lloyd at news@trussvilletribune.com and follow him on Twitter @GaryALloyd.