ACT-SO: Time to show what they know

By Sydney A. Thomas

Teen correspondent

Tears streamed down Stephanie Middleton's face as she watched her 16-year-old daughter take the stage for the second time.

Thirty minutes earlier, Tamara Middleton had given her oration for the 250-plus in attendance, leaving with a standing ovation and few dry eyes in the room. Now she returned, dressed casually, dragging a chair to the edge of the stage to sit in front of an anxious audience that awaited her gold medal-winning monologue.

African American high school students nationwide participate in a variety of categories for the Afro-Academic Cultural, Technological, and Scientific Olympics - or ACT-SO - for scholarships and other prizes. The ACT-SO program was established 30 years ago by the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People.

Tamara Middleton, a rising junior at Indian River High School in Chesapeake, is one of nine South Hampton Roads students who won gold in local ACT-SO contests and earned a spot in the national competition Wednesday through Aug. 4 at Walt Disney World in Orlando, Fla.

Tamara, who won gold in both oratory and dramatics, is joined by fellow Chesapeake residents Bethany Cartwright (poetry), Jasmine Childs (sculpture) and Jerenda Manley (contemporary instrumentals); Virginia Beach's Wesley Chavis (painting and drawing), Joy Fitzgerald (dance), Ashley Harrington (medicine and health) and Marquis Lyles (music instrumentals for contemporary and classical); and Smithfield's Michol-Marie Taylor (music vocal for contemporary and classical).

Qualifiers for ACT-SO nationals must win gold in local competitions after about six months of mentoring and local enrichment programs. Medals are given for each category by a panel of judges who specialize in each field. Rewards for local gold medalists include savings bonds and complimentary travel and/or hotel accommodations at nationals.

The 2007 ACT-SO nationals featured 26 categories and hundreds of competitors.

Tamara has been a participant of ACT-SO for two years and is enthused about her first trip to Walt Disney World. As a freshman last year, she won a gold medal at the local competition for oratory and went to nationals in Detroit. Though she did not place, Tamara said the trip was a "fabulous experience."

"I learned so much."

Tamara, inspired by a close friend to compete in dramatics this year, won a gold medal in that category and repeated as a gold medalist in oratory.

She said she prepared differently to improve her chances of winning a medal at nationals this time around.

"I prepared earlier with more thorough information. I included more factual information, more current events that people will be able to relate to."

While the competition and its judges unnerved her as a freshman, she felt "a whole lot more comfortable the second time around."

Ashley Harrington, a rising senior in the Health and Science Academy at Bayside High School in Virginia Beach, is preparing for her third trip to ACT-SO nationals.

As a freshman she won gold medals for poetry and photography and went to the national competition in Washington D.C. As a sophomore, she participated in photography and in the medicine and health category, winning locally for both, and going onto nationals in Detroit. There she received a silver medal for her presentation on melanoma skin cancer in African Americans, along with $1,500 and a laptop computer.

"I came up with the idea for the project from my grandfather," said Ashley, whose grandfather passed away from the disease in 2000. "The problem is too many African Americans believe that they can't get skin cancer, for whatever reason. But that's obviously not true."

This year, Ashley continued in the medicine and health category, winning gold locally for her presentation on the metabolic effects of high-fructose corn syrup and its link to obesity in poorer communities.

"This year, our family started eating healthier, and I noticed some significant differences in our health," said Ashley, who added that she found a prevalence of high-fructose corn syrup in cheaper, less healthy foods.

Chesapeake's Jerenda Manley is a rising college freshman at Hampton University, where she plans to major in music education. Manley is participating with ACT-SO for the first - and last - time because it is open only to high school students.

A 2008 graduate of Oscar Smith High School in Chesapeake, Jerenda started playing the violin in fifth grade, a talent that led her to take home the gold in the Contemporary Instrumentals category in the local competition.

"I think my parents are more excited about it than I am," she said, laughing. "But this experience is very exciting."

Sydney A. Thomas, a rising senior at Oscar Smith High School in Chesapeake and a participant of The Virginian-Pilot's 2008 High School Diversity Journalism Workshop, sythy@cox.net