Gates: UNC her next challenge By Paul S. Brittain
Kathryn Gates of Albert Gallatin made some of her best friends while playing soccer on the Lady Colonial varsity team, as well as playing for the Victory Express Cup team from Washington. Now, she says she’s ready to move on as a student at the University of North Carolina. “I made the greatest friends I’ll ever have playing soccer. We always tried to have fun,” Gates said. “I’m looking forward to having a new beginning. I’ll miss my roots here, but Carolina offers so many opportunities for me. I want to change the world.”
Attending UNC will also offer an opportunity for a friendly inter-family rivalry, because her older brother, Tom, is a student at North Carolina State.
Kathryn is the daughter of Jon and Kelly Gates of Point Marion. She has a grade point average of 4.6, and is the top-ranked student in a class of 279. She will represent her school as its top female scholar/athlete in the 2010 graduating class and will be recognized at the second annual Fayette County Sports Hall of Fame banquet, to be held at 6 p.m. Saturday, June 26, at Penn State Fayette, The Eberly Campus.
In addition to being captain of her soccer team, her activities have included being editor of school newspaper, part-time employee as cashier at the Point Marion Foodland, three-year member of National Honor Society, Interact Club, Students Against Destructive Decisions, model United Nations speaker, Mock Crash planner and participant, Water Festival volunteer, Bleacher Creatures and yearbook staff. Her honors included the Gifted and Talented Program, A.P. classes, Top 20 and Student of the Month, Fayette County, for October 2009.
Her studies at North Carolina will include majoring in sports and exercise science as a pre-med student. Her long-range plans are to attend the University of Pittsburgh Medical School and become an orthopedic surgeon.
Kathryn’s late grandfather, Marvin Gates, had the biggest influence on her life.
“He gave me a way of looking at life that was different from anyone else,” Gates said. “He said that there is a difference between right and wrong, and the right thing isn’t always the easiest.”
When asked to provide advice for success to fellow students, she said, “You have to prioritize and decide what is most important. Right after school, I had an hour for homework and then would go to soccer games. Scholastics should come first, even though you are involved in a sport.”