Heights student instills ‘confidence’ in peers

• A Licking Heights student crafted positive videos for the school this year
• Once focuses on the trait ‘confidence’
• The district posted the video on its website

PATASKALA – High school, for many students, is about growing and preparing for the next step in life, whether that step involves college, the military or a real-world job.

Licking Heights High School senior Kenneth Abarra is a perfect example of that four-year maturation process.

Abarra, who graduates May 28 with his classmates at the Celeste Center at the Ohio Expo Center in Columbus, entered high school somewhat unsure of himself.

He is leaving it a much more confident and self-assured person.

The word “confident” is apt, Principal Kenneth Kraemer said.

Heights teachers at the start of each school year appoint a number of students to one leadership team for each grade level.

“The idea is basically to instill (positive) values in the student body,” Kraemer said.

In serving on this year’s senior team, Abarra spearheaded a project to create videos promoting positive character traits.

One of his videos was based on the trait “confidence.” Another was based on the trait “compassion.”

The videos were popular around the school, and the district posted them on its website.

Abarra starts the confidence video with images of students struggling, both in the classroom and on the athletic court. The video follows the students through their day and ends with the screen going black with an unseen narrator intoning the warning they could be “doomed to repeat it all tomorrow.”

When the blackness cuts to an alarm clock, the narrator says, “Or you do it the right way,” and the video shows the value of confidence as the students succeed where they previously failed. A swelling orchestral number serves as the musical score to the short video.

Kraemer was impressed by the video and its affect on the student body.

“He’s definitely a kid who goes above and beyond, who just wants to give back to the school,” said Kraemer, noting Abarra did not have much time — less than a week — to finish each of the videos.

Abarra, who had previous experience creating issue- and humor-based YouTube videos, viewed the senior leadership team and the videos as a way to hit his classmates with positive messages on their own terms.

“Hearing it from a peer has a lot more priority to some people,” he said.

Abarra will graduate with a 3.8 GPA, and aside from his work with the senior leadership team he competed on the school’s golf and volleyball teams for his final three years of high school.

He was not nearly as involved or as confident as a freshman and sophomore.

“The first two years I really didn’t want to be a leader,” he said. “I more wanted to absorb things. It wasn’t until my junior year I started to open up at the end of the year, and I felt like I could say what I wanted to say.”

Abarra is happy he did find his own voice — and confidence — before his time at Heights ended.

He said he is going to miss many of his fellow classmates and teachers after graduation.

“It really hit me (recently),” Abarra said. “I might not see these people ever again, my friends, the teachers who helped me, following graduation.”

Abarra plans on continuing his education at Ohio State University. He wants to major in engineering and minor in film or business.

As for his post-college plans, he is, not surprisingly, not short on confidence.

“Once I get to a certain point in life, I really want to start my own startup company,” he said.

Graduation time

Licking Heights High School is holding its graduation ceremony at 7 p.m. Thursday at the Celeste Center at the Ohio Expo Center, 717 E. 17th Ave., Columbus.

Want to see Kenneth Abarra’s confidence video?

View it at www.youtube.com/watch?v=XLRDOptEUcY