Arabella Gipp Earns Second-Straight Lawrence Youth of the Year Honors
LAWRENCE, Kan. – Boys & Girls Club of Lawrence CEO, Monica Dittmer, explained the heartfelt reason why the Youth of the Year program is incredibly special after Arabella Gipp earned the 2023 Lawrence Youth of the Year honors at Liberty Hall Thursday night.
“Because it’s not a competition, and it’s not even just a group of kids – it’s a family,” Dittmer said. “That’s what we do. We bring these kids together, we put them in a circumstance and we provide the support they need to watch them grow into whoever they want to be. It’s a family atmosphere, it’s a safe place to try new things, it’s somewhere they can take a risk – they might fail, but they might also do something really amazing. That’s what makes this whole process so special.”
Presented by Mid America Bank, Youth of the Year celebrates the life-long relationships that kids develop with the Boys & Girls Club. Those students who earn a Youth of the Year nomination embody the values of leadership service, academic excellence and healthy lifestyles. They exemplify the powerful impact that the Boys & Girls Club has on kids in Lawrence.
BGCLK celebrated five candidates in total in its annual event. Chloe Clossen (Sophomore, FSHS), Ohene Danso (Sophomore, FSHS), Audrey Rice (Graduated Senior, FSHS), La’Ron Williams (Junior, FSHS) and Gipp were each nominated by their Club mentors to vie for the top honor a Club kid can receive.
Gipp, a sophomore at Lawrence High School, was named the Lawrence Youth of the Year winner for the second year in a row. The 2023 candidate pool was larger than 2022, so she was certainly aware of the increased level of talent. But, just as Dittmer explained, Gipp didn’t think of any of them as her competitors.
“They are all my best friends,” Gipp said. “We started off just playing UNO (at the Center for Great Futures), making each other draw 24 cards in a row… and now we are all on the stage sharing the spotlight. We are all so excited for each other. We stood up for Audrey, and we stood up for Albaraa (Almohammadi) – we have each other’s backs. We all had amazing speeches, and I’m so proud of every single one of us.”
Gipp will now advance to the Kansas Youth of the Year ceremony in March, a title she claimed once already in 2022. She is a dedicated advocate of mental health for not only herself, but her fellow students, her fellow athletes and her Indigenous community (Standing Rock Sioux). Gipp was open and vulnerable about how being the reigning winner can cause a lot of heightened anxiety.
“I put a lot of added pressure on myself that probably didn’t need to be there,” Gipp said. “But again, with some of my mental illnesses, it’s kind of hard not to. I finally just focused on, ‘This is for fun. These are some of my best friends, and at the end of the day, it doesn’t really matter which of us wins.’ Once that really resonated in my head, it was so fun and exciting.”
That truly showed when she delivered another phenomenal speech. She opened up about how her mentors at the Club helped her to trust men again after her dad left when she was very young. In a powerful snippet of her speech, Gipp explained how she is her most confident self now that she’s a member of the BGCLK family.
“I thought I was too white to call myself Indigenous. I thought I liked men too much to call myself queer,” Gipp said in her speech. “But (my BGCLK mentors) accepted me for me. I didn’t have to change the way I spoke or the way I acted around them. I could be me – the passionate, Indigenous, loud, queer, opinionated woman I am.”
The daughter of Jessica Gipp and the only Lawrence High student in this year’s candidate class, Gipp is involved in no shortage of activities. She plays LHS and Club volleyball, participates in Keystone Club, LHS Debate, NAACP youth council and serves on the Student Mental Health Advocacy Group for Lawrence Public Schools. She also works part-time at the front desk of the Center for Great Futures. She plans on being an activist or politician after attending Stanford University and majoring in Political Science.
Brian Hanni, the Voice of the Jayhawks and a dedicated supporter of the Boys & Girls Club, emceed the event. He even showed off his dance moves during a snafu with the Liberty Hall curtain, doing whatever it took to keep the show running smoothly. All five candidates gave impassioned speeches, showing extreme courage standing onstage and sharing their stories in front of nearly 400 audience members. Those in attendance included elected officials, the BGCLK Board of Directors, longtime donors, Lawrence Public Schools educators and lots of families and friends.
Chloe spoke about the importance of positive body image. She shed light on the fact that eating disorders are much more prevalent in high school than people realize, explaining how she even resorted to skipping meals for days when she didn’t like what she saw in the mirror.
Audrey gave her mom credit for pushing her to do better in school and spoke emotionally about the difficulties she faced in high school. She talked about her little sister, Olivia, knowing how to cheer her up after a bad day. Of course, she didn’t leave out Mr. Michael and the Ball 4 All League he created for teens who attend the Center for Great Futures and might not have anywhere else to play.
La’Ron talked about recognizing good qualities in himself and working hard to eradicate the term ‘social outcast’ or being socially awkward. Instead, he knows people can simply be misunderstood and should not be left out. Ohene admitted that when he was younger, he focused more on fitting in rather than standing out. Because of the Boys & Girls Club, he realized he would be accepted for who he is.
Needless to say, when it came time to select the winner, the judges had a difficult task at hand. During the afternoon, the panel (Julie Dean, Tom Harper, Dr. Dee Ann DeRoin, Dr. Larry Englebrick, Keon Stowers, Sgt. Bronson Star and Dr. Krista Whitney) interviewed each candidate and gave their application packets a complete scoring review. The speeches given during the evening’s program accounted for the final piece of the puzzle. After a tough round of deliberations, Gipp came through with the highest score.