Seguin Sunrise Rotary Club members had a tough decision to make Tuesday afternoon when they narrowed five scholarship applicants down to three.

The club named Navarro High School junior Julie Smith one of two runners-up in the Guadalupe County Outstanding Youth Citizen of the Year scholarship competition.

Smith’s 99.906 GPA has earned her a rank of No. 2 out of a 106-student class.

Smith plans to attend a Christian university, where she will study education with an emphasis in Biblical studies and Spanish.

After college, she wants to pursue missionary work and hopes that two languages will allow her to reach more people.

“I think Spanish courses could put me in a lot of different places and also help with where we’re at right now,” Smith said.

When asked what she would change if she were a teacher at NHS, Smith said she would try to reduce the school’s cliquishness.

“There are petty problems and big cliques because people don’t understand each other,” she said. “I would try to break down those barriers — though that’s probably a task bigger than me.”

Smith has participated in numerous community service projects and mission trips, including collecting canned goods, refurbishing houses, working on flood relief, participating in choir outreach performances and organizing a garage sale and car wash for charity.

She is an active member of Oakwood Baptist Church Youth, the varsity track and cross country teams, the National Honor Society, the Drug Awareness Council, Interact Club and Fellowship of Christian Students.

Over the summer, Smith will travel to Chicago to help out with Kids’ Club, a grassroots community outreach program. She will also participate in Girls State.

Smith was named one of two runners-up out of 19 applicants. Each student submitted a 500-word essay, resume, high school transcript and letter of reference.

The Seguin Gazette-Enterprise co-sponsored the annual scholarship program.

The winner of the $500 scholarship award will be announced in a Sunday article.

This entry was posted by Taman Siswa on Thursday, May 25, 2006 at 12:48 pm and is filed under Scholarship. Tags: Baptist Church, car wash, Chicago, Christian Students, College, Drug Awareness Council, Education News, Fellowship, Interact Club, Julie Smith, Kids’ Club, National Honor Society, Navarro High School, Rotary club, Scholarship, Seguin Sunrise Rotary Club, Student, Study, . You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.