Big Walnut’s Meade ready for next step in life

Story and photo by

LIZ ROBERTSON

Big Wal­nut High School’s Ash­ley Meade

Senior year has gone by fast, con­cedes Big Wal­nut High School senior Ash­ley Meade.

“It’s crazy. I remem­ber walk­ing into high school my fresh­man year and was told it would fly by fast. It did,” she said.

And she has enjoyed every minute of it, she said. Ash­ley speaks highly of the spirit and atmos­phere among stu­dents, staff and fac­ulty at the school.

As a senior, there are also some bit­ter­sweet moments. As cap­tain of BW’s soc­cer team, Ash­ley said it was hard to see her final sea­son with the team come to an end.

“The team was really close; they were like fam­ily. And we had a really good sea­son,” she said. “Now I only see some of them in the hall­ways any more.”

Ash­ley also just fin­ished 4-H. She has been a mem­ber for the past 10 years, and has been a mem­ber of the royal court the past two years, serv­ing as princess in her junior year and as fair queen this year.

“It’s def­i­nitely been a lot of fun,” Ash­ley said.

Besides serv­ing on the royal court, she has also vol­un­teered in the 4-H aware­ness pro­gram, speak­ing to third-grade stu­dents about the 4-H expe­ri­ence. Ash­ley also served on the junior fair board. In addi­tion, through­out her time in 4-H, she has taught younger mem­bers about goats — her pri­mary project.

“I’m so glad I joined the pro­gram,” she said, adding that in addi­tion to lead­er­ship skills, 4-H has improved her team skills, com­mit­ment and dedication.

Ash­ley attended the Mar­tin W. Essex School for the Gifted and Tal­ented last sum­mer at Otter­bein Col­lege, where a select group of stu­dents from around the state met and took classes, attend­ing lec­tures and labs while stay­ing on cam­pus for a week. The expe­ri­ence was valu­able, she said.

But while some areas of her life may be slow­ing down, Ash­ley is still busy with club soc­cer (both now and in the spring), National Honor Soci­ety, Leo Club and Big Brother Big Sisters.

Of course, there’s also a busy class sched­ule to deal with. Ash­ley attends honor classes, includ­ing advanced place­ment cal­cu­lus, advanced place­ment lit­er­a­ture, Span­ish 4 hon­ors and government.

She is also busy with band — play­ing clar­inet since the fifth grade — and par­tic­i­pat­ing in march­ing band, pep band and con­cert band.

Kather­ine Daw­son was Ashley’s pre-calculus hon­ors teacher last year and has her in advanced place­ment cal­cu­lus this year.

“Ash­ley has many redeem­ing qual­i­ties; among those are her patience and per­se­ver­ance. She works well with oth­ers and is happy to clearly explain prob­lems or top­ics she under­stands when oth­ers may not. On the other hand, she also seeks help and con­tin­ues to work at solv­ing a dif­fi­cult prob­lem until she under­stands it,” Daw­son said.

Daw­son said Ash­ley is a mem­ber of Mu Alpha Theta, the Math­e­mat­ics Honor Society.

“By accept­ing her invi­ta­tion, she has com­mit­ted to help­ing other stu­dents who may be strug­gling in math­e­mat­ics. Her will­ing­ness to do so demon­strates the con­fi­dence she has in the math­e­mat­ics courses she has already com­pleted,” Daw­son said.

Ash­ley has shown her lead­er­ship capa­bil­i­ties in other areas as well. She is trea­surer of both the Leo Club and National Honor Soci­ety. In NHS, the group plans to adopt a fam­ily for Christ­mas; in Leo Club, they just com­pleted a fall fes­ti­val for kinder­gart­ners through sec­ond grade and are now paint­ing a map on the black­top. The group also is rais­ing money for heart patients.

While she has not decided on her major for col­lege, Ash­ley does know she will minor in Spanish.

“It’s one of my favorite sub­jects. I always like learn­ing some­thing new, learn­ing about the land and the cul­ture, ” Ash­ley said. She is also look­ing for­ward to vis­it­ing Spain with a school group this summer.

As for what col­lege she will attend, Ash­ley is look­ing at Otter­bein Uni­ver­sity, Ohio Wes­leyan Uni­ver­sity, Cap­i­tal Uni­ver­sity and The Ohio State University.

“I’m going in unde­cided. I’ve no real idea of my career path, but I’m sure I will find direc­tion once I’m in col­lege. I know I def­i­nitely want to work with peo­ple,” she said.

Ash­ley said she may con­sider play­ing soc­cer if she attends one of the smaller schools, but prob­a­bly will not con­tinue with band, instead focus­ing on her studies.

Look­ing for­ward to fin­ish­ing out her senior year and say­ing good­bye to this part of her life, Ash­ley said she will be some­what sad.

“This is some­thing I’ve grown up with. It’s been my whole life. So it’s kind of sur­real,” she said of the Big Wal­nut com­mu­nity, adding that she is ready to take that next step in her life. “I’m def­i­nitely glad I grew up in Big Wal­nut. It’s kind of sad, but I’m def­i­nitely excited to leave Big Wal­nut with a bang.”

Ash­ley will be going to Spain in the sum­mer, and to the Bahamas to play with the high school band on a cruise dur­ing her spring break.

Ash­ley offers the fol­low­ing advice to underclassmen.

“Def­i­nitely soak up every­thing from the moment you are here. It will fly by, so take advan­tage of what you get and are able to do. This is why I wanted to do so much. I wanted to do all of it while I could.”

Ash­ley is the daugh­ter of Rod and Melody Meade of Sunbury.

Posted by Liz Robertson on Nov 30 2012. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS Feed. Comments can be made below.