Jelissa Wins Premier's Excellence Award
October 2008
The Premier's Excellence Awards recognize the best all-round Grade 12 graduate in each college region of the province. The Award considers academic performance, service to the community and school service and participation.
Nominations are made by high school principals. The award encourages talented and dedicated British Columbians to pursue advanced academic studies at British Columbia post-secondary institutions. In past years fifteen awards of fifteen thousand dollars each, one for each college region, have been distributed.* A sixteenth Premier’s Excellence Award was established this past year to recognize a Grade 12 student with special needs. Jelissa, a student from the Greater Victoria school district, was recognized for her outstanding performance by winning this award.
Jelissa is eighteen and she hopes to emerge with a Bachelor of Arts in either political science or economics accompanied by the potential to work overseas with foreign aid agencies. She says that “I'm the person that you do not want to sit behind in a movie theater, but given my 90 lbs build, the one that you'd prefer to have crowd surfing above you at a punk rock show. Aside from horror flicks and numerous rock concerts, I spend a portion of my time advocating that the Vancouver Canucks will, in the foreseeable future, return with the silver trophy. As both a Braille and print user, I have had the luxury of experiencing the best of both worlds.”
Jelissa would like to thank Marla Clarke, Fran Kordoski, Hanna Leavit, Jane Litman, Bruce Taylor, PRCVI and SET-BC for their support. Jelissa’s principal, Dr. John Fawcett, Mount Douglas Secondary School submitted her name for the award this year. Dr. Fawcett comments that “Jelissa is an outstanding Mount Douglas student and citizen. Year after year, Jelissa achieves top marks in all subjects with a full academic course load. Jelissa asks for no favors – her only request is to be treated like everyone else. Jelissa enjoys sharing her language skills in conversational Cantonese.
Jelissa is exceedingly bright and possesses a driving passion to make a difference in our world. We have already seen many signs of Jelissa’s “world community” interests. Jelissa is intrigued to learn more about how blindness affects people, particularly in developing countries. She is curious about research advances in the study of the causes of blindness and potential cures. At school, Jelissa has been active in our student leadership program and has been an active learner in the select Challenge Program for gifted, talented and creative students. Last year, for example, Jelissa used extensive skills in computers to develop a comprehensive website for the Canadian National Institute for the Blind. This contribution resulted in recognition by the University of British Columbia.”
Jelissa’s Resource Teacher for the Visually Impaired, Jane Litman says that “Jelissa is a bright, engaging, confident young woman who has drive and ambition. She is able to identify her own needs and skills she wants to acquire, which is why we spent her grade 12 year working on cooking, food preparation, poetry, and university research skills. Jelissa is articulate and charming, and won over her teachers in the Challenge program. I know that many of her teachers almost forgot that Jelissa was visually impaired and simply regarded her as one of their brightest. It was a pleasure teaching Jelissa and I am very proud of her as the recipient of the award.”
Marla Clarke, Jelissa’s Educational Assistant says that she had the pleasure of working with Jelissa for the past 12 years and during that time she has grown into a very confident, self-assured young lady. Marla feels that one of Jelissa’s strongest assets is determination to succeed. Jelissa’s motto is and has been “Let me try.” This desire to learn and do her best at all times has been evident during elementary school PE soccer games, field trips through the dimly lit forests, or learning to draw and paint. The most challenging goal that she set for herself was to learn to read braille at a college level rate. She wanted to read as well as her peers and to be able to complete her work and hand it in when it was due for all the students. This level of determination allowed her to maintain top grades in District 61’s Challenge Program. Throughout all of these years Jelissa has also been able to balance school work and hanging out with her friends. Marla states that she knows that at university, Jelissa will accomplish her goals and be a strong advocate for others.
Congratulations Jelissa! We are very proud of you!
For more information on the Premier's Excellence Award, view the StudentAidBC site.