By By ANDY HAMILTON / Niles Daily Star
NILES – Niles Community Schools honored its top 139 students this morning at the sixth Annual Breakfast of Champions.
All students in attendance at the University of Notre Dame Joyce Center had earned all A's. The seventh grade class had the most representatives with 36.
"Achieving straight A's each and every time is a difficult accomplishment, and a noble accomplishment," said Jim Craig, Niles director of curriculum.
Two presenters spoke to the students, who were in attendance with their parents. Lindsey Leech, a 2004 Niles graduate and student at Michigan State University, gave the high school and middle school students three important things to remember for being successful in college – learn how to study, expect to make mistakes and don't be afraid to meet new people.
"I think one of the biggest misconceptions about college that I've found so far is that the kids that do the best are the smartest –not true at all. It's the kids that work the most," Leech said.
Mistakes are OK to make in college, Leech said.
"You're going to whether you try to or not. High school is kind of like a crutch. You have your parents there, you have your teachers there and everyone's really involved with you and everyone's really helping you as much as they can, and you don't realize how much you don't have … when you go away to college.
"The most important thing about mistakes in general is that you learn from them," said Leech, who said she has switched her major area of study three times.
Finally, Leech told the audience she has learned to succeed in college by making new friends and approaching her professors. Getting involved in extracurricular activities provides a support system away from home, she said.
"It helps a lot because it's not that your parents aren't existent anymore, but you talk to them on the phone but you don't have that support system right in front of you," she added.
The morning's second speaker was also a Viking, and a classmate of Niles High School Principal Jim Knoll. Dr. Robert Raster graduated from Niles in 1984 and earned degrees from Notre Dame, Wayne State University and Northwestern University.
Raster's message was about hard work and the "delayed gratification" that comes with it. He also encouraged students to have respect for community.
"As a part of a community you have a sense of responsibility, and I think the community really helped me to move and get where I wanted to be," Raster said.
He also spoke to a recent study that concluded young people today are more narcissistic than past generations.
"What concerns me is that the result of that would be is you wouldn't have a sense of community, a sense of relationships and a shared responsibility … and I hope that as students you will remember that.
"You learn a lot from struggling," Raster continued. "Those moments in life you feel like it's the hardest, but looking back it's some of the most profound important points in your life."