Duly recognized for their work in Hamilton Heights community
During the Hamilton Heights School Board meeting on Wednesday, Vicki and Arnett Cooper were given the Ida Yaney Overholser Award for their volunteer work with Teach One to Lead One (T1L1).
Each year, the Ida Award is given to a person who has worked behind the scenes to help children overcome obstacles to become leaders through T1L1 mentoring. T1L1 is a unique mentoring program that requires caring partners in the community and within the school corporation.
Arnie was an early adopter of the program. As a school board member, he advocated for Hamilton Heights to host the first T1L1 pilot program in 2019 – the first of its kind in the state of Indiana. Vicki and Arnie volunteered as mentors in the high school during that initial year.
Since then, the program has served 663 students in schools across central Indiana. The Coopers were essential to seeing the T1L1 program take root.
“Arnie and Vicki were key to getting this program off the ground,” T1L1 Central Indiana President Kevin Yaney said. “Both of them connected with students immediately and it was great to see them interact with them. To this day, one of those students mows the Cooper’s lawn and shovels snow for them.”
Ida Yaney Overholser was born in Indiana in 1885. Throughout her life, she experienced heartbreaking loss and tragedy, but overcame these obstacles with a lot of grace. In her 100 years, she served as a caregiver to people in need and a comforter to those who had experienced great loss in life, as she had. The Ida Award honors her legacy to bestow grace and kindness to people in need.
T1L1 just finished its fifth year in Hamilton Heights Schools. For more information on Teach One to Lead One, go to T1L1.org.