photo by: Richard Gwin

The 2016 Journal-World Academic All-Star judges are, from left, Dr. Robert Harrington, Rand Ziegler and Austin Turney.

With high grade-point averages, test scores and long lists of extracurricular activities, the 10 members of the Academic All-Star team certainly look good on paper. However, it was the students’ essays that revealed to judges the effort behind their accolades.

“It takes more than just scores and grades and school accomplishments to be successful,” said Robert Harrington, who has been a judge for the Academic All-Star program since its inception in 1997.

Harrington is a professor of psychology and research in education at Kansas University. He was joined on the panel of judges by Rand Ziegler and Austin Turney. Ziegler is department chair of behavioral and health sciences at Baker University. Turney is a retired accounting professional and former Lawrence school board member.

About two dozen students were nominated by their principals or counselors for the Academic All-Star team, and judges selected 10 for the honor. Harrington said the varied backgrounds, experiences and, in some cases, the degree of adversity faced by this year’s nominees were striking.

“I think that speaks to something that we know about an education but we don’t speak a lot about,” Harrington said. “And that is it doesn’t really make any difference where you come from as long as you have the value of education.”

Just among the 10 finalists, students told of living in other countries, with siblings with special needs or feeling like they didn’t quite fit in. Whatever the circumstances, Harrington said many of the students were influenced by their experiences and families.

“Family is a motivation and an inspiration, and many of them talk about how even through struggles that every student has at some point, the family was there to encourage them to keep going,” he said.

Harrington said he was also pleased with the variety of school districts represented by the students. The 23 nominees came from 13 high schools, and among the 10 finalists seven schools were represented.

“There was a nice breadth of representation across Douglas County, so that was nice to see,” he said.