As a high school principal, I am always interested in where our graduates go in life and what careers they chose. I had the opportunity recently to follow up on three outstanding Wando graduates, the Voit brothers. All three accepted full scholarships after high school at the University of Texas as McDermott Scholars. Walter and Richard were valedictorians at Wando, and Benedict graduated second in his class.  These incredible young men are the sons of Dr. Eberhardt and Ann Voit.  

Walter will finish his Ph.D. at Georgia Tech this year. He is in the Material Science Department and is working with memory shape polymers, which is a plastic that becomes soft and malleable when heated and holds its new shape when cold. If, however, it gets heated again, it will return to its original shape. This process is not a new one, but he has developed certain new techniques to make the plastic become soft at any temperature he wants to set by changing the properties of the plastic.  He incorporated his first company in December of 2007: Syzygy Memory Plastics, Inc.  The company has found industrial uses for his processes, and he hopes to begin small scale production this summer in applications, from hearing devices to orthopedics to dentistry. He has four papers submitted for publication and is in the process of applying for patents for his new techniques.

Richard is in his third year of an eight year M.D./Ph.D. program at Southwestern Medical in Dallas. He completed the first two years as any M.D. student would, passed the first qualifying exam and is now doing lab work for the Ph.D. part, looking at zinc-finger nuclease proteins, which can be used to manipulate a cell’s DNA in search of a cure for diseases like sickle cell anemia, hemophilia, AIDS and some blood cancers. When he finishes his dissertation, he will then go back to the medical school part and do rotations as the M.D. students would in year three and four.

At the end of year eight, he will be awarded both the M.D. and the Ph.D. together. Then he has to do a post-doctoral work  in scientific research and a residency before both the medical field and the scientific field will accept him as one of their own.  He hopes to stay in cancer research and run a lab.

Benedict graduated, as did both Walter and Richard, from UT Dallas. Walter got a B.S. and an M.S. in computer science; Richard got a B.S. in Microbiology, and Benedict received a B.A. in Political Science.  Benedict started out in computers and actually worked at the National Labs in Los Alamos after his freshman year, converting old computer code to C++ in the astrophysics lab and then analyzing the data and publishing a paper about modeling supernova explosions used to predict star age and behavior, but he said he couldn’t envision a lifetime of that, so switched majors his junior year.

He likes Political Science a lot and again published a paper on the long-wave theory in American Politics and presented a paper at a conference in Las Vegas. He now intends to go and get an MBA in a couple of years after gaining work experience. He is working at a firm in Dallas that does modeling and forecasting for Credit Unions on their investment strategies.  He is learning the ropes in economics through the detailed work from the bottom up.

The McDermott scholarship program gave all three boys fantastic opportunities to do exciting summer travel and internships, which has had a lot to do with their choices.  Walter spent two summers at the National Labs in Los Alamos, Richard and Benedict both one each. The McDermott scholarship paid for an 8-month study in Germany for Walter at the University of Cologne, a 12-week language study program for Richard in China and a 12-week study summer for Benedict in Frankfurt at the Goethe Institute. 

Benedict also had a summer internship at the Dallas Federal Reserve in their cash department. The program has sent the scholars as a class to London, Washington D.C., Guanajuato, Mexico, NYC, and given them tickets to the Dallas Opera, the Dallas Symphony, and free passes to all of the Dallas museums. The McDermott Scholar program also encouraged them to volunteer in local elementary schools where 65% of the parents don’t speak English. 

Although I would certainly credit the parents for raising such talented, creative sons, Ann Voit shared these comments with me about the education her children received in the public schools of Mount Pleasant.

Ann said, “While the boys are doing well and have made good choices, it hasn’t been without encouragement of teachers and programs all along the way. When they were at James B. Elementary, it was a magical and wonderfully challenging atmosphere.  Trish Yandle turned Moultrie around just as Walter was starting 6th grade, and then you came in Walter’s sophomore year at Wando to start the amazing transformation there. They truly have been blessed by a system that has worked. They may not be able to recognize it yet, but once they see the bigger picture of education that isn’t directly related to their own endeavors, they will begin to recognize what I already see.

There is no way, ever, for us to be able to thank all adequately for their help in shaping the boys lives, so my only hope is the boys will be able to give to the next generation what has been so freely endowed to them.”

The Voit success story is representative of many of our graduates who are now engaged in challenging careers and impacting the lives of others in positive ways.

I am personally proud of every one of them and delight in hearing their stories and accomplishments.