HEM's Wyatt gets Heisman

Wyatt Phillips, a senior at Hanna-Elk Mountain-Medicine Bow high school (HEM), was told that high school was going to be tough. In the end, he learned that with a little effort, it wasn't as hard as everyone cracked it up to be.

Phillips was the Wyoming state winner for the Wendy's High School Heisman Award, which recognizes excellent high school performance in sports, academics and community leadership. He was nominated for consideration for the national award as only one of 100 other students throughout the country, one male and one female from each state.

Guidance counselor Travis Ward at HEM directed Phillips to the application for the award, in which he was asked about athletics and school. Phillips has received accolades for both sports and academics. He maintains a 4.0 GPA, was named all-conference in football, holds seven school football records, plays basketball, runs track, is a national Future Business Leaders of America participant, is on the National Honors Society and has been student council president for two years.

Phillips is passionate about sports, having participated in athletics his whole life. Science is his favorite subject in school, and he will study biology at University of Wyoming with hopes of becoming a physician's assistant.

"Definitely doing sports has helped me with my schoolwork," Phillips said. "Some say that it takes away from your schoolwork because you have hours of practice and no weekends but actually most of the kids that do sports are the ones that are generally more advanced in their classes, and it's done a lot for me."

Phillips commends the program for giving students in Wyoming the opportunity, and Ward agrees, adding that it was nice to see it given to a student at such a small school. Ward will continue encouraging students to apply in years to come now that he knows more about the program.

HEM Principal Steven Priest is proud of Phillips and the school winner, Haley Clark, and looks forward to seeing how these two high achieving students do in their future endeavors.