Student art, essay, poetry contest winners honored at Hoover City Leaders Breakfast

The Hoover Parent Teacher Council today honored city leaders with a breakfast at Discovery United Methodist Church, as well as student winners of poetry, art and essay contests.

The Hoover Police Department honored two seniors from Hoover and Spain Park high schools who submitted winning essays about peer pressure.

The winners were Rotimi Kukoyi from Hoover High and Tess Hooper from Spain Park High. Each received a $500 scholarship, thanks to a donation from Frank Barefield, the owner of Abbey Residential, which owns apartment complexes in the Southeast and Southwest.

Rotimi, in his essay, pondered whether fighting peer pressure is as simple as saying “no.” It often requires much more effort, he said.

The proliferation of social media and other communication advances is a double-edged sword, offering both positive and negative implications, Kukoyi said.

“We are more connected than ever, yet this means that we are constantly surrounded by outside influences,” he said. “The effect of this change? We are flooded by a steady stream of pressure from our peers, our families, the media and society as a whole. If we are unable to filter the information, we remain at risk of drowning among the incessant waves of peer pressure.”

Fortunately, people have free will and have control over some of the pressures they face by maximizing the positive influences and minimizing the negative ones, he said.

“A close community of positive influences reinforces one’s self-confidence and good judgment,” he said. “Not only does this social support make it easier to say ‘no’ in difficult situations, but it also makes it easier to avoid such situations in the first place.

“We must find comfort in behaviors not because they are well-liked but because they are right and moral,” Kukoyi said. “This is a difficult but necessary shift in judgment to make, for popularity is rarely indicative of moral integrity.”

Hooper noted that while peer pressure often carries a negative connotation, it also can be used in a positive way.

For example, people often feel pressured to do something kind when someone does something kind for them, she said.

Hooper said she has felt peer pressure to do well in her classes at Spain Park due to a competitive drive to succeed. That kind of pressure allows people to reach a potential they may not achieve if they lacked the motivation that came from competition, she said.

Also, elementary school teachers use peer pressure to create good outcomes by offering class pizza parties as a reward if the class reaches a certain milestone, Hooper said. No one wants to be the one that keeps their class from getting a pizza party, she said.

“The fear is what pressures them to do better,” Hooper said.

Kate Barber Campbell, a fifth grader at Shades Mountain Elementary, won an essay contest about why the school resource officer at her school, Jordan Berry, is the best SRO. Campbell described Berry as strong, brave, kind and smart and noted how he welcomes students into school and always watches over them.

Liana Galpothdeniya, a third grader at Trace Crossings Elementary, won this year’s poetry contest with a poem about firefighters being heroes, while Eliza Carpenter, a fourth grader at Brock’s Gap Intermediate School, won a fire prevention art contest.