April 2008 Odyssey Newsmagazine

Eve

Remembering

Photo courtesy of The Daily Tarheel

Above: A CONNECTIVE SMILE: 2004 Clarke Central High School graduate and valedictorian Eve Carson was able to befriend all types of people during her time at CCHS. “You didn’t have to be Eve’s best friend for her to connect with you ... she had a connective smile,” CCHS Principal Dr. Maxine Easom said. Next page: Left: STUDENT LEADER: Eve Carson swings on a tree on campus at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, posing for photos for her 2007 campaign for student body president. “Eve made a huge difference as UNC’s student body president,” current UNC freshman and 2007 CCHS graduate Lateefah Gresham said. Right: REST AND RELAXATION: Eve Carson takes a moment to meditate while traveling in Cairo. Being a Morehead-Cain scholar allowed Carson to travel to countries including Cuba, Egypt and Ecuador.

On March 5, 2008, Clarke Central High School 2004 graduat student body president Eve Carson was killed in a residenti Hill, NC. Now, Weeks after her death, CCHS students and st her smile and her ability to connect with all kinds of peop

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hen Eve Story and Layout Carson Bryan Barks graduated Features Editor from Clarke Central High School as valedictorian in 2004, staff and students marveled at her accomplishments, both academic and extracurricular. Only four years earlier, Carson had begun her career at CCHS, quietly becoming involved in school activities, unknowingly establishing a legacy of excellence.

“I found myself one day realizing that there was this beautiful girl who was always with people you didn’t necessarily expect her to be with, doing things you didn’t expect her to be doing,” CCHS Principal Dr. Maxine Easom said. “But she was always doing some kind of project, getting this going or that going. Suddenly I realized, ‘Who is this child that keeps being around and getting things going?’”

The “child” Easom noticed was Carson, then a freshman, who would later be elected to homecoming court, play several sports, attend the Governor’s Honors Program, and serve as both president of National Honor Society and student body president. But even as an underclassman, those who knew Carson recognized her potential.

Counselor Sam Hicks came to CCHS in 2001, when Carson was a sophomore, and noticed her almost instantly.

“I was young and fresh out of college and still naive, but I could immediately see that there was something really special about this kid,” Hicks said. “There was kind of a buzz around her and about her, and it was all legit. She was that bright, and she was that cool.”

Before coming to CCHS as a freshman, Carson, a graduate of Clarke Middle School, spent a semester in Seville, Spain with her mother. This experience allowed Carson to be immersed in the Spanish culture and language, and she enrolled in AP Spanish her sophomore year.

24 Photo courtesy of www.facebook.com,

Foreign Language Department Chair Jim Jones was impressed with Carson’s language skills in AP Spanish, but more striking, he said, was her dedication to her academic pursuits.

“She certainly had lots of academic talents. She was able to make wonderful grades in her classes seemingly effortlessly,” Jones said. “There were times when I know she had to really work. It wasn’t effortless, but she made it seem that way.”

Science Department Chair Buddy Sims, who taught Carson both ACP and AP Biology, also noticed her intellectual perseverance.

“She just truly enjoyed learning, whatever it was, she enjoyed learning it,” Sims said. “She was always willing to do whatever it would take to learn stuff, but, again, not for any ulterior motive - she just really wanted to know more.”

Carson came into biology class every day with a new question, Sims said. Her textbook was lined with sticky notes, on which she scribbled the answers to her questions before generating new ones.

“I can just see her sitting at her desk with her biology book full of Post-it notes and just every day, ‘Mr. Sims, I have a question,’” Sims said. “It was always something very thoughtful and something she wanted to know more about. But that was the way she was all the time.”

Carson’s determination and inquisitive nature also propelled her extracurricular life. Among numerous other activities, Carson was an active member of NHS from her sophomore year until her senior year, when she was elected president of the organization. “(Eve) had a huge leadership role in NHS. She always wanted to do something new, and I think she went to every single volunteer opportunity that was possible,” Julia Mills, CCHS 2005 graduate, said.

As a leader in NHS, Carson inspired Mills to become involved in the Athens community through service projects and stay involved after leaving high school.

“I think she really encouraged me to get involved in volunteer stuff, and I’m still really involved in the Athens community,” Mills said. “Because she presented so many different opportunities and made them fun, she could describe anything and make you want to go.”

NHS sponsor Ellen Harris agreed that Carson’s enthusiasm made others eager to participate in service activities through NHS. “People just wanted to do what Eve wanted to do because she was fun and she had so much fun doing things,” Harris said. “When she liked something, she just loved it, and she’d tell everybody about it. I think that’s something people really appreciated about her -- her ability to draw other people along with her enthusiasms.”

Harris recalled the members of NHS wrapping

gifts for Operation Christmas Child, a volunteer project associated with Samaritan’s Purse.

Through such projects, Carson was able to lead the members of NHS with enthusiasm, including her younger brother, CCHS 2005 graduate Andrew Carson.

“I have a recollection of that crew down in my room with presents and wrapping paper and ribbon all over the place,” Harris said. “Oh, they had a wonderful time! Eve’s presents were not the prettiest, and Andrew’s weren’t at all. But they had a terrific time wrapping them up!” .....Carson was also involved in Student Government Association at CCHS, and became student body president her senior year. .....Through SGA, Carson encouraged others, including CCHS 2007 graduate Lateefah Gresham, to become active leaders within the school. Former SGA sponsor and English teacher Mark Dupree introduced Gresham, then a freshman, to Carson in order to get her involved in SGA.

“When she liked something, she just loved it, and she’d tell everybody about it.”

-- Ellen Harris, Foreign Language department teacher “After talking with (Eve) for about two minutes, she was like, ‘You’re perfect for the position!

You should run,’” Gresham said. “So I ran, won and worked with her throughout the remainder of the year.”

As Carson’s neighbor since childhood, CCHS junior Emma McLeod was inspired by her passion and involvement in activities such as NHS and SGA. “Eve was always my role model. I always looked up to her because she was like, perfect,” McLeod said. “Everyone in the neighborhood knew her and respected her because she was the most wellrounded person.”

But Carson’s enthusiasms extended beyond her areas of strength.

“Eve played soccer, and she played it with a vengeance, but she wasn’t the greatest soccer player in the world,” Easom said.

“If you look at pictures of Eve, she had really long arms and really long legs and she was just like legs and arms all over the place. Her friends would joke that she couldn’t keep track of the ball because her legs would be out in front of her,” Mills said.

While soccer was not Carson’s strongest suit, Easom admired her willingness to play and improve.

“We tend to think that Eve was perfect at everything she did. But what she was perfect at in that situation was that she played soccer like she was the best soccer player on the field,” Easom said.

“She wasn’t, but she played it like she was, which made her play pretty decently. She had that capac-

“Th mo

duate, valedictorian and former ential neghborhood in Chapel d staff remember her talents, people. ity -- she never thought she couldn’t do or shouldn’t do.”

Although Carson was talented and confident in various areas, Jones never saw Carson’s peers display any resentment towards her.

“I did not see the jealousy that sometimes you see. I don’t know why,” Jones said. “Her smile comes to mind -- you can’t have any negative feelings when she gives you that smile, and she gave it to everybody.”

McLeod agreed that Carson’s friendly personality made it difficult to begrudge her successes.

“She was one of those people you would hate normally because they’re such an overachiever and good at everything they do, but there was no way you could hate Eve because she was so amazingly sweet and nice,” she said.

Carson’s genuine nature and self-assuredness also contributed to her likeability, Harris said.

“For people in general, but for teenagers in particular, they spend a lot of time thinking not of what they’re doing but how people are reacting to what they do,” Harris said. “Eve had none of that.

She was just what she was.”

In fact, Hicks said, Carson’s strong sense of self allowed her to transcend social divides within CCHS. “Typically, if you see somebody who has all these things going for her -- she’s brilliant, she’s a beautiful girl, she’s athletic -- people in that position can tend to stick with their group of people. But she wasn’t like that,” Hicks said. “She could have a conversation with anybody from any background, and she wouldn’t do it in a way that was condescending. She did it because she cared about people and she wanted to know everybody.”

Even outside of CCHS, Carson was able to reach

if she could be this bright light to everybody and surround herself with anybody and everybody, I wanted that, too. It didn’t matter who you were or what race you were -- you could be friends with anybody.”

The diversity Carson valued in her friends also played a major role in where she decided to attend college. Although she received offers from many prestigious schools, ultimately, Carson chose to accept a Morehead-Cain scholarship from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.

“I think she wanted to be in a place where she could know all kinds of people, be in contact and experience all kinds of people. And I think that speaks to her wanting to understand the world,” Sims said. “She could have gone to any of the hoitytoity private schools, but she wanted to be in a public university where she could experience all types of people.”

Like many of Carson’s teachers, Easom discussed Carson’s options for post-secondary education with her, weighing the advantages and disadvantages of each possibility.

“She was wondering, ‘Should I choose this because it’s prestigious?’ She was going through how to make this decision on what values,” Easom said. “But in the end … the diversity was important to her, and she just said, ‘I want to go to a public institution.’ When it came down to it, that’s what it was. And boy, did she make an impact.”

At UNC, Carson was involved as a North Carolina Fellow in a leadership development program for undergraduates, Phi Beta Kappa honor society, the Academic Advising Program, the Chancellor’s Committee for University Teaching Awards and the Committee on Scholarships, Awards and Student Aid. Continuing her involvement with student government, Carson was also elected UNC student body president in 2007.

“I’ve never seen someone work so hard to achieve all of their goals,” Gresham, now a freshman at UNC, said. “When I would talk to Eve, she would be checking her e-mail on her phone every ten minutes because she was getting that many messages.”

At UNC, Carson had a second opportunity to study abroad. Throughout her career at UNC, she studied in Havana, Cuba and volunteered in Chillanes, Ecuador as a Morehead-Cain scholar.

In Chillanes, Carson gained medical experience as she worked with doctors in Seguro Social Campesino and Hospital Amigo.

After returning from Ecuador, Carson used photos and sound clips she took to create a video entitled “The Gifts of Poverty” for the Morehead-Cain Foundation website.

“The fact is Eve probably taught us a lot more than we taught her -- I’m sure she did.”

-- Dr. Maxine Easom, Clarke Central High School principal out to people she had never met. “I remember one time at a neighborhood Christmas party, there was a group of 40-year-old women talking -- they were from the neighborhood and all knew each other.

There was another woman who had just moved in and didn’t really know anybody, and she was kind of wandering around,” McLeod said. “The group of mature women just sat in their circle talking and not really making and effort to include her. And Eve, the youngest one there, took the initiative to go talk to her and introduce her to everyone.”

The initiative Carson took in order to meet people did not go unnoticed, and served as inspiration for Mills to befriend a wider range of people in high school.

“She was definitely a role model in that I could look at her and see that she was friends with all kinds of people, so I didn’t feel weird being friends with all different people,” Mills said. “I knew that

Photo courtesy of www.facebook.com,

“I think that one of the most important lessons I learned from being in Chillanes … was that poverty is not a pitiable thing,” Carson said in the video.

“In Chillanes, I saw a respect for poverty and respect for a non-material way of life. It’s just great to learn that you can take it, and I learned that over the summer. I can take it.”

For Jones, “The Gifts of Poverty” encapsulates Carson’s attitude about people and her perspective on the world.

“When I saw that two years ago, I just sat at my desk and cried,” Jones said. “Just how very perceptive she was -- I was just so very proud of her …

When she walked across the stage that night at graduation, I’m not sure if I could have predicted that, but once I saw that, it was like, ‘Yes, of course.

That’s Eve.’” While CCHS graduates, students and staff continue to grieve Carson’s death, Easom feels her spirit can be preserved and held as a model of goodness -- one from which everyone can learn.

“We, as staff members, would like to think we taught Eve a lot. The fact is Eve probably taught us a lot more than we taught her -- I’m sure she did,” Easom said. “Once the staff can get past the devastation, we’ll say, ‘We’re going to raise some more like that.’ That’s a challenge for us.”

For Harris, preserving Eve’s spirit means finding the good in everyone, regardless of race, social class or level of intelligence.

“I think I’m going to try to look at all my kids, every last kid, as an individual and try to see what it is their mothers love about them,” Harris said.

“Sometimes you have to look a little harder, but I believe, and Eve believed, that it’s there in every person.”

As someone who looked to Carson as a role model throughout her high school career, Mills feels that each person who knew Carson has a responsibility to ensure that her characteristics continue to positively affect the world.

“Eve didn’t have the selfishness that so many of us have, so if people lived their lives like she did, there should be a big difference. There should be people reaching out to people that they wouldn’t normally and trying to make other people happy,” Mills said. “People from Clarke Central graduate and go all over, so Eve’s spirit should stem all over the world.”