Breaking News: Junior Board Winners Announced

After two rounds of preliminary presentations, the top five places for Junior Board were announced on March 31. Among the top three were The Rose Brooks Center, String Sprouts and Reconciliation Services.

Junior Board is a program at East where groups of students pick a non-profit organization and then present about why that non-profit should receive money to a panel of judges. The judges then score each proposal and award the top five teams money to donate to their non-profit.

There were 15 teams that presented and five made it to the final. The first two days of presentations were prelims, and the final day was reserved for the top five teams to present again.

According to junior Olive Henry, even teams that don’t make it into the finals and won’t place are rewarded with $600 to give to the charity they represented in their presentations.

This year the charity that won was Rose Brooks Center, a non-profit that’s working to break the cycle of domestic violence. The team of seniors with Hannah Phillips, Riley Kimmel, Grace Padon, Andie McConnell, Annabelle Cook and Emily Cooper won $3,500 for the Rose Brooks Center.

“We won first place last year and second the year before,” said Phillips. “This year we were very determined and we went into it knowing there was very tough competition. We prepared and practiced as much as could to be confident in what we were presenting.”

Second and third place were taken by Henry and junior Brooklyn Manning. Henry’s charity, String Sprouts, won $2,500. String Sprouts helps cover instrument costs and lesson fees for students at schools where 60 percent of the school population is on free and reduced lunch.

Manning’s charity, Reconciliation Services, won $2,000. Reconciliation Services works to integrate both sides of Troost Ave. and build more community gathering spaces to unite the community.

“It was pretty rewarding to see that a group of high schoolers could do that much for an organization, especially one that we all feel so passionate about,” said Manning. “We know by donating money that it will help a lot of people at Reconciliation Services, even if it is just giving someone a lunch for a day.”

Check out this infographic to learn more about each of the top five finishers.