Volunteer efforts pay off
When Kootenai High School senior Nicole Luppens graduates tonight, she will also be a certified nursing assistant. For the past year, Nicole has been completing a dual program, taking health occupation training in addition to her required courses for high school.
She first became interested in nursing when she became a candy striper during junior high. Over the next few years, Luppens volunteered about 800 hours to the program.
“I knew that’s what I wanted to do for the rest of my life,” she said.
Luppens plans to attend North Idaho College for two years before transferring either to Lewis-Clark State College or Idaho State University to obtain her bachelor of Science degree in nursing. After college, she wants to spend about five years volunteering her skills to the Nurses Without Borders program. Helping people in medically deprived areas is her dream, she said.
When asked her advice for upcoming high school seniors, Luppens said, “You can do anything. Even if you haven’t done well previously in high school, you don’t have to know what you want to be until college.”
Luppens has proven this point with the number of extracurricular groups she has participated in her senior year. She belongs to Idaho Drug Free Youth, Teens Against Tobacco, and Health Occupation Students of America. As a member of the Volunteer Club, she participated in food drives, fund drives to help victims of Hurricane Katrina, and school ground beautification projects, such as planting flowers and painting bleachers at Kootenai High in Harrison.
Nicole was part of the Business Professionals of America team that went to state representing Kootenai High. The team placed third, competing in parliamentary procedure. Competing as an individual, Nicole went to state for her extemporaneous speech skills.
For the past two years, Nicole has volunteered as a Peers Encouraging Abstinent Kids mentor. This year she worked with sixth graders – an experience she described as wonderful.
The daughter of Lynette and Chris Luppens, Luppens has two older brothers and speaks of her family with warmth and pride. She will be the first in her immediate family to attend college.
Kootenai’s graduating class of just 17 students has developed special friendships. “We’ve become so close. They all feel like family.”