The Nick Kodys Award, named for Coral Gables High School’s legendary football coach, is voted on by area coaches and awarded to Miami-Dade County’s best football player. Every year, the Coral Gables Kiwanis Club then arranges an awards affair to present the trophy and celebrate the accomplishments of the payer selected. This year’s award winner, Jakhari Gore, is the best player ever to play for Columbus High, according to his Football Coach Chris Merritt. He is not only a SuperPrep All American but is also listed as the #6 all-purpose RB in the Country by Rivals.com.
The audience attending the award dinner enjoyed watching many of the highlights of Gore’s career on a large screen television. Coach Merritt noted that while he gained 4,666 yards rushing and made 64 touchdowns in his prep career, that those amazing stats are misleading. It seems they had to take Gore out of the game early on numerous occasions so as not to run up the score. In fact, Coach calculated that Jakhari had cumulatively been taken out a total amounting to 8 games.
Adding to the evening’s excitement was the appearance for former award winner, Coral Gables High and UM star, Frank Gore, now playing in the pros, who is Jakhari’s cousin. Frank Gore is the only player in the history of the award to win two years in a row, 1999 and 2000.
Helping orchestrate the event were Kiwanis President Bill Adams, Past President Doug Kellner and Hollis Batchelor, whose efforts have insured the continuation of this prestigious award over the years. In other news, close to 100 high profile female philanthropists joined forces with top community and college leaders at the Biltmore Hotel in Coral Gables to raise funding for student scholarships at Florida International University’s Herbert Wertheim College of Medicine (HWCOM). The luncheon featured presentations from Founding Dean John Rock, M.D., and Executive Associate Dean for Student Affairs Sanford Markham, M.D., as well as several medical students who benefit from scholarships.
Dr Rock noted that a recent study by the Macy Foundation shows that medical students who graduate with little or no debt are more likely to become primary care physicians – an area of critical need in our community.
The fashion portion of the affair included informal modeling of local designerVictoria Lopez Castro’s spring 2010 collection. Sponsors included Northwestern Mutual Financial Network and Victoria Lopez Castro. The PR sponsor was Roar Media. Finally, congratulations to all the Canadians in our reading audience on the incredibly exciting Winter Olympics. While the US racked up the most medals, Canada reined supreme with Gold. Of course, the final hockey game was probably one of the most exciting games ever going into overtime and making both countries proud of their respective teams. Until next week, keep making each day count.
Gloria Burns is Executive Director of the Community Foundation of Pinecrest, a 501 (c) (3) non profit organization, as well as a columnist for C o m m u n i t y Newspapers. Keeping abreast of community activities is a challenge. If you would like to submit information for this column, please send your news via e-mail to < gloriagalburns@aol.com >.
