Widener Student From Jackson Leaves Legacy of Character Development

A Jackson native continues to make an indelible impression on young lives near her college campus even after she graduates.

Annalicia Geeter founded Northern Star Sports, an after-school sports program for underprivileged children, with a classmate at Widener University in Chester, Pa. as part of the university's Presidential Service Corps/Bonner Leader Program.  Geeter says Northern Star Sports is very much geared to teaching kids basically perseverance, things like leadership to learn values that will help them along through a lifetime through sports as a medium."

Geeter says clearly sports is not the primary goal, it's a vehicle to get kids attention who are so easily influenced by the images they see on TV.  She says this year they had 65 young participants, from second through fifth grades, at Chester's Stetser Elementary School along with twelve coaches.  She says "my other coaches, we assess them. We have them reflect on their own. We teach them sportsmanship and we kind of walk them through the lesson but they really get in and start to create values for themselves."

The Presidential Service Corps program grants members an annual $5,000 scholarship upon completing 300 hours of community service and participating in leadership development experiences each academic year.  However, Geeter says even though they receive a scholarship, the nonprofit is about more than money.  She says once they really started getting involved in the Community and started to see a difference in the kids, it became much more than just that.  She says they stopped counting the hours and began counting the people they could make coaches.

She says underclassmen have vowed to continue the nonprofit and they plan to include training Chester High School students to act as coaches in the program and raise funds to purchase equipment.

Geeter graduated this year with a degree in Business Management and Marketing and is planning to head to Manchester England as a Lacrosse Coach and player.  She says she not only plans to promote the game of Lacrosse but is hoping to promote character development across the pond as well.

In addition to the PSC/Bonner Leader scholarship, Geeter is the recipient of a Widener Presidential Scholarship. This year she earned recognition as the PSC/Bonner of the Year.

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