By T. Scott Boatright
Being named a valedictorian often means focusing primarily if not only on studies, sacrificing other wants to strive for academic perfection.
Lincoln Preparatory School Valedictorian Kamora Kimble credits her concentration on earning that perfect 4.0 grade point average throughout high school, but that didn’t prevent her from also focusing on other goals and activities during her years as a Lincoln Prep Panther.
“Time management — that was the hardest part of it all for me because I also worked at Chick-fil-A, so between doing that and focusing on my classwork, I stayed pretty busy,” Kimble said.
But that was only part of what Kimble took on as she was also part of Lincoln Prep’s chapter of the National Honor Society, volunteering for MedCamps and the school’s Teen and Police Service (TAPS) program, which was directed by the Grambling Police Department.
That program works with the National TAPS Academy, working with teens and law enforcement agencies in the Greater Houston Area; Columbus, Ohio; Upper Darby, Pennsylvania; Las Vegas; Lynchburg, Virginia, Washington DC and Grambling.
The TAPS Academy provides training for law enforcement officers and youth throughout the United States.
“And I also did a lot of volunteer-type work my junior and senior years,” Kimble said. “I was also the Football Sweetheart on the Homecoming court. Senior year was especially crazy. It was a lot of work, but also a lot of fun.”
Kimble, the daughter of Lynelle Kimble and Jamar Kimble Sr., will head to Natchitoches later this summer to study to become a physician’s assistant at Northwestern State University.
“I want to do something where I can help and at first thought about studying to become a certified nurse,” Kimble said. “I also considered the business or records side in the medical field but wanted to be more hands on. I took a class at Louisiana Tech that showed me all the different paths of going into the medical field.
“Then I thought about the physician’s assistant aspect of becoming like a cross between a doctor and a nurse and decided that’s the way I wanted to go.”
Kimble believes that already having completed enough college coursework to earn an associate degree from Southern University at Shreveport has prepared her for the next steps she’ll be taking.
“I think I’ll thrive in college because I’ve already shown myself that I can handle those kinds of courses,” Kimble said.
