Community Corner
School Advocate Helps Students in Solar Power Challenge
Brookhaven, GA, resident Kim Gokce created the Cross Keys Foundation to help students from a community he says is "low income and high achievement." Sponsored by Grape-Nuts.
About this sponsorship: In honor of the 60th anniversary of Sir Edmund Hillary’s historic ascent of Mount Everest, Patch and Grape-Nuts are teaming up to highlight those who inspire people around them to climb their own mountains.
Kim Gokce of Brookhaven, GA, is chairman and founder of an advocacy group for the new city’s only high school, Cross Keys High School, an old institution that Gocke’s group is helping to renovate. Despite its challenges (many students are learning English as a second language and live at or below the poverty level), Cross Keys students reach high academic scores, and many are able to attend some of the nation's top schools.
Find out what's happening in Holly Springs-Hickory Flatwith free, real-time updates from Patch.
Gokce was recently named Metro Atlanta YMCA Volunteer of the Year, and he was also appointed by Georgia Gov. Nathan Deal to the Brookhaven Commission, a group which led the startup of the new Atlanta-area city of Brookhaven.
Gokce talks here about his involvement in Cross Keys’ efforts to build a solar-powered car and take part in a cross-country rally with it.
Find out what's happening in Holly Springs-Hickory Flatwith free, real-time updates from Patch.
Q: What’s the biggest challenge you’ve taken on?
A: By far the biggest challenge to date has been helping plan and fund the participation of Cross Keys High School in the Winston Solar Challenge. This project is one of the most sophisticated, expensive and technically challenging projects in North America for high school students. We were able to help jumpstart a team of students at Cross Keys in 2012, and they designed and built an amazing solar-powered car they were able to display at the 2012 event, winning an engineering award. The team will not be able to participate in 2013 due to losing their faculty coach in retirement. Our current goal is to partner with a replacement faculty member in 2013 and get the team funded and prepared for the Winston Solar by the summer of 2014, which will be a cross-country rally of 1,600 miles from Dallas to Los Angeles.
Q: What inspired you to take on this challenge?
A: We sponsored a VEX robotics team at Cross Keys in 2012 that won the County League Championship and qualified for World Championships in Anaheim, CA, but there was no money to send them. Their hard work and dedication inspired local businesses to sponsor the team in an eleventh hour push by the Foundation and we beat the team's travel deadline by one hour. They competed against the best in the world from the U.K. to China and placed in the first percentile out of 400 of the best teams in the world at VEX World Championships 2012. Seeing the dedication and abilities of the young people inspired us to strive to support them in the Winston Solar Challenge. We recruited private donors and local businesses to help the students reach their goal via direct and in-kind giving.
Q: Did you succeed?
We succeeded with phase one - Georgia's first ever, 100-percent, solar-powered car was designed, built, and integrated by the team. Until they compete in the rally, we have not fully realized the challenge. When they succeed in this effort, I will do what I always do - stand in awe of them and brag about them endlessly! I like to say our community is characterized by low income and high achievement. The Foundation simply seeks to provide opportunities for them to show the world.