The MidCity Advocate 05-28-2025

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Pelican Philanthropy

Seniors get $80K in scholarships from N.O star C.J McCollum

BY JOSEPH CRANNEY Staff writer

Zayden Hills says he knew what he wanted to be when he grew up by the time he was 6 years old

A lawyer

He was a creative kid whose mom, a teacher, encouraged him to read and write He loved “The Chronicles of Narnia” and thriller novels. He read Maya Angelou and wrote poems he performed at open mics when he was still in elementary school.

But it was a workday visit to his uncle’s New Orleans law firm that really settled it.

“I found being an attorney to be the most interesting thing when I was younger,” said Hills, now a senior at Edna Karr High School, about to pursue a career in the law

Hills is among 11 New Orleans high school seniors selected to this year’s class of McCollum Scholars, a program funded by New Orleans Pelicans star C.J. McCollum and his wife, Elise.

McCollum Scholars launched last year in partnership with the

New Orleans-based nonprofit College Beyond. Each scholar receives $80,000 over four years in last-dollar scholarships, designed specifically to close the financial aid gaps that remain after grants, institutional aid, and other scholarships are applied. The scholarship includes access to one-on-one counseling, monthly workshops and college tours.

“In a city where the narrative around New Orleans youth is too often shaped by deficit and limitation, the McCollum Scholars program stands as a powerful counterexample,” said Clara Baron-Hyppolite, College Beyond’s executive director. “It shows what young people are capable of when they are supported, seen, and no longer held back by financial barriers.”

Baron-Hyppolite says that the scholarship is specifically intended to reduce students’ family contributions and eliminate the need for loans.

Among the universities where this year’s class will attend: Vanderbilt University, Syracuse University, Providence College and Tulane University

“I want to provide students with the resources they need to think outside the box about what they can achieve in their lives,” McCollum said in a message on College

Beyond’s website. He joined the Pelicans team in 2022 Hills, the Edna Karr student body president with a grade-point average above four points, will attend the University of Southern California, where he’ll major in English, an education that will allow him to continue to read and write a lot, because after all: To be a good lawyer you have to be a good writer Hills said.

He had lots of options when it came to deciding where to go to college — USC, Amherst College in Massachusetts, Morgan State in Baltimore, Loyola University New Orleans or Lehigh University in Pennsylvania, McCollum’s alma mater.

In making his choice, Hills went back to a feeling he had as a kid in New Orleans. A dream that he could be far away somewhere at peace. California, he thought.

“California, when I was younger, always seemed like an escape to me,” he said “I always knew I wanted to go I just didn’t know how.”

The remaining 2025 McCollum Scholars are:

n Keyria Billew, Livingston Collegiate Academy, will attend Tulane University on the Mayoral Scholarship.

n Arsenio Bolds Jr Edna Karr

ä See PELICAN, page 2G

‘We must be kind when we can ’

The near noon sun offered no slanting light. It was brash. It was bold. It was blinding.

When I took my seat on the bench, I thought about a line from a Cher movie I never saw, but an old boyfriend told me about 34 years ago. He told me about a character in the movie “Mask” who talked about things that were a drag, listing “holes in my shoe, dust in my hair, no money in my pocket and the sun shining on my face.”

I sat on the bench and reflected on what the character from the movie I never saw meant.

Then I thought about so many other people who, like that old boyfriend, said things I’ve mostly forgotten except for the strange snippets that stuck. Words, phrases and moments that still shape how I see the world — and ripple into the lives of others I’ve touched.

I thought of Mrs. McLean, my high school junior English teacher who in class one day off-handedly said, “If your ears are pierced, you should never leave your house without earrings.” In the more than 16,000 days since, I can count on one hand the times that I forgot to put on earrings to go wherever I was going.

I thought of a caterer whose name I can’t remember I met her in Reno, Nevada, in 1990. She quickly told me how to make a dish with Italian sausage, fresh basil, Roma tomatoes, whole cream, Parmesan cheese and penne pasta. I made it shortly thereafter and loved it. I’ve been making it ever since, and it is “the meal” my family loves most, though my husband might argue that that designation lies with his tacos.

I thought of a Slovak woman I met on a bus in 1993 who helped me navigate a confusing bus transfer and ended up actually giving me a bus ticket when the snow started to fall. I protested that I couldn’t accept the bus ticket. Her English was broken, but somehow she said one of the most poetic sentences anyone has ever uttered to me. She said, “The world is small. We must be kind when we can. Take the ticket.” And so I did, and the sentence and moment profoundly changed the way I saw the world. Back to the reality of the present day, I looked at the notso-far-away horizon across the lake at Solomon Retreat Center and considered the fuzzy line between where I end and others begin — and how we all get meshed together in so many ways. The sun continued to shine as I listened to the songs of a Carolina wren, a persistent tufted titmouse and a blue jay A perfect breeze came along and blew my hair in a way that I felt sure made

‘Double agent’ retires after 41 years with La. ecosystem

Shirley known as Louisiana Sea Grant and LSU AgCenter marine extension agent

BY LAUREN CHERAMIE Staff writer

Mark Shirley, a Louisiana Sea Grant and LSU AgCenter marine extension agent, retired in March after 41 years of service. He is known for many things during his career, but most notably, he developed Marsh Maneuvers established in 1989 as an immersive education program for 4-H students to experience Louisiana’s coast. The program motivates students toward studying coastal ecology and biological sciences

Shirley is an aquaculture specialist with expertise in crawfish, alligator and recreational fish production. Since the ‘80s, he has educated new crawfish farmers on production and harvesting practices.

In 2024, Shirley received the Lifetime Achievement Award from the Louisiana Wildlife Federation

This interview was edited for length and clarity.

How did your love for nature come about?

I grew up in the middle of New Orleans, so I’m a city kid born and raised. But my dad and I went fishing a lot, so I enjoyed coastal Louisiana as a kid. I was catching speckled trout and redfish. I was in Boy Scouts and enjoyed camping and the outdoors.

I went to LSU for my bachelor’s degree in wildlife management, and then I got my master’s in wildlife management. My first job was at Rockefeller Wildlife Refuge in Grand Chenier, where the center of alligator research was and still is for the world. Back in the ’70s, they came up with the idea of having an alligator harvest system and the alligator farm program

At Rockefeller, I got a lot of experience working with alligators but also with water fowl research, duck banding, river otters and marsh management.

When did you start working with the Louisiana Sea Grant program and LSUAgCenter?

In 1984, I started working for the program and the center The Louisiana Sea Grant organization is similar to the land grant university program. Basically, I was a double agent.

Congress allocates money which comes through the National Oceanic Atmospheric Administration to fund research and extension work on coastal issues in all the coastal states and Great Lake states.

On the AgCenter side, when the land grant university system started, Congress developed that program to do agricultural research and later figured out that they needed to have extension agents. They did research but also extended the information to farmers around the country

I was a marine extension agent with Louisiana Sea Grant and a county agent with the LSU AgCenter

What were some of the daily tasks of a double agent?

As a marine extension agent, I was involved in communicating the research that was developed at LSU and any other coastal university to shrimpers and fishermen. I worked with landowners who harvest wild alligators, farmers who developed their alligator farms and with crawfish farmers to help them develop their businesses.

Over the years, my expertise involved coastal issues, marine fisheries, freshwater fisheries, crawfish aquaculture and alligator aquaculture.

Within all of that, I also did the Marsh Maneuvers 4-H program that’s available to students from fourth grade to high school.

As an expert in crawfish aquaculture, do you prefer seasoning in or on top of your crawfish?

It makes a big difference. Do not put salty spices in your crawfish boiling water

When you boil your crawfish in salt water, it’ll make part of the meat stick to the shell and make them a little bit harder to peel.

Once you boil them, put them in a container and sprinkle spices on top, and they will absorb some of that flavor

If you boil them just right, the backstrap — the piece of meat that sits on top the vein — stays on the tail. That gives you much more meat. If they cook just right and not too long, and not in salt water,

PELICAN

Continued from page 1G

High School, will attend University of Arkansas-Pine Bluff on a football scholarship.

n Kiali Brown, The Willow School New Orleans, will attend Lehigh University

n Alejandra Flores-Rasgado, Livingston Collegiate Academy, will attend Macalester College as a QuestBridge Scholar

n Nandi Gayles, Ben Franklin High School, will attend Providence College on the Posse Foundation

of service.

when you pinch the tail, you can actually pull that vein out.

If you add a couple of sticks of butter or margarine to your boil, that’ll help them peel a little bit easier too.

How can the average Louisianan be a good steward of the coast?

It gets into the policy and political arena to support the coastal restoration efforts and organizations The state government has the Coastal Protection Restoration Authority, and the federal government has the Coastal Wetlands Planning, Protection and Restoration Act.

Along the coast, we have the Coalition to Restore Coastal Louisiana, as well as the Louisiana Wildlife Federation and Barataria-Terrebonne National Estuary Get involved with some of these nongovernmental conservation groups that sometimes do field trips, encourage policy decisions and encourage the investment of tax dollars to projects.

I look at coastal restoration as paying rent to keep using this

Scholarship.

n Gerald Jackson, Abramson Sci Academy, will attend Louisiana State University

n Elissa Merlin, The Willow School New Orleans, will attend Tulane University

n Akeim Nelson, G.W Carver High School, will attend Tulane University

n Jayden Simmons, G.W Carver High School, will attend Vanderbilt as a QuestBridge Scholar

n Ezekiel Whitley St. Augustine High School, will attend Syracuse University on the Please Foundation Scholarship.

RISHER

Continued from page 1G

plumbers

people

Inspired Book Club choice wins Pulitzer Prize for fiction

BY JOY HOLDEN Staff writer

“James,” by Percival Everett, the second book for the 2025 Louisiana Inspired Book Club, has won the Pulitzer Prize for fiction, in addition to the National Book Award and the Kirkus Prize. A twist on the classic Mark Twain novel “The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn,” this work of fiction features Jim as the narrator, not Huck, and fills in the gaps of the original text when the two became separated. This selection will be an excellent read to transition into the summer Take the journey with the Louisiana Inspired Book Club and read “James,” then join in the discussion on the virtual Inspired Book Club discussion at 12:15 p.m., June 10. Everett is a distinguished professor of English at the University of Southern California Dornsife College of Letters, Arts and Sciences, and is widely regarded as one of the most original voices in American literature. His body of work spans satire, Westerns and experimental prose. His 2001 novel “Erasure” was adapted into the Oscarwinning 2023 film “American Fiction.”

people he meets along the way

The novel is darkly funny at times and achingly sad at others, yet action-packed and irresistible.

Email Jan Risher at jan.risher@ theadvocate.com.

He has received the Windham Campbell Prize from Yale University He lives in Los Angeles with his wife, the writer Danzy Senna, and their children. Everett reimagines the epic tale of Huck and Jim with Jim’s Odyssean journey to freedom for himself and his family The relationship with Huck is still there, but the focus is on Jim and the

When the enslaved Jim overhears that he is about to be sold to a man in New Orleans, separated from his wife and daughter forever, he decides to hide on a nearby island until he can formulate a plan. Meanwhile, Huck Finn has faked his own death to escape his violent father As readers of American literature know, thus begins the dangerous journey by raft down the Mississippi River toward elusive freedom.

Jim has always been a favorite character in American literature, but “James” elevates him to a multidimensional hero who exhibits intelligence, wit, courage and compassion.

Email Joy Holden at joy.holden@ theadvocate.com.

The life of tree-seedlings that travel the state

40 acres and now stands at 100 acres. It’s owned and operated by the Missouri Department of Conservation.

JANA ROSE SCHLEIS

Contributing writer

Editor’s note: This story, created by Jana Rose Schleis for KBIA is part of the Solutions Journalism Network. Louisiana Inspired features solutions journalism stories that provide tangible evidence that positive change is happening in other places and in our own communities solutions that can be adopted around the world

Throughout the month of April, Columbia, Missouri, residents observe Arbor Day — the conservation holiday that encourages planting trees with tree seedlings given out in fourth grade classrooms and at a Saturday farmers market. For Missourians, many of the Arbor Day tree seedlings originate at the state-run tree nursery

This year, approximately 80,000 sycamore seedlings were sent to fourth graders across the state. The fast-growing tree is native to Missouri and does especially well in the state’s streamside habitats. Generally planted in spring, sycamores are beneficial for wildlife as the tree’s soft wood affords birds and small mammals a place to burrow

The tiny trees begin their journey where they’re grown in the Texas County town of Licking. The seedlings are inspected by about a dozen staff at Missouri’s George O. White State Forest for length, thickness and root quality

The nursery was founded by the U.S Forest Service in the 1930s to assist landowners in reforesting the state. The Ozarks had been heavily logged as railroads stretched west. The original site was just

Nursery supervisor Mike Fiaoni manages the tree production facility, and selects the species that are sent free of charge to students across the state for Arbor Day Teachers also receive materials to include in lessons about the species and how to plant the trees

“We want to educate young students as far as the importance of trees, the values of trees and so this is the way we can do that start reaching them at a young age,” Fiaoni said.

Fiaoni picked the sycamore for this year’s Arbor Day tree because it can grow well across the entire state. The seedlings are carefully packaged in bundles of 25. They’re placed on top of a bed of moss, given a spritz of water wrapped in tear-proof paper, placed in a cardboard box and stacked in a UPS trailer for the journey across the state.

The nursery grows, cultivates, packages and ships 2 million bare-root seedlings to landowners, farmers, schools and local governments each year

“A lot of folks think, ‘I want to do something for conservation but I’m one person or I don’t have a lot of money What can I do?’”

Fiaoni said.

“By simply planting a tree whether it lives 10 years, 20 years, maybe even 100 years — the ecosystem you’re forming around that tree, the value that it’s adding to your home or to the property, the oxygen it’s giving off, the value it’s adding to the wildlife,” he said.

“There’s just so much of an ecosystem that’s going to evolve around that single tree it’s so important.”

From Licking to Columbia

This year, more than 1,000

of those seedlings traveled the 127 miles to Columbia and were given to enthusiastic farmers market shoppers, many of whom lined up early on a Saturday morning.

“We had people waiting,” said Eric Schmittel, a forester with the city of Columbia. “We showed up here probably about 6:30 — there were people waiting here already, and the line has just been around the corner.”

Schmittel manages trees in the city’s 70 parks and trails as well as those in the urban environment downtown Schmittel orders around 15 to 20 species of seedlings to give away for Arbor Day and said the most sought-after are those that produce fruit, nuts or flowers. Columbia recognizes “Arbor Month” — culminating with the seedling giveaway

“They’re free first of all, which is everybody’s favorite price, but then they’re also really excited about the different varieties,” said Hollie Campbell, a member of a volunteer group called “TreeKeepers” who spent the morning handing out seedlings to eager market attendees.

The TreeKeepers are trained by city foresters on the basics of tree care — planting, pruning and watering — and assist in conservation projects across the city, including invasive honeysuckle removal.

Campbell has been a part of the group for three years and said she initially joined to learn more about trees and “give back” through conservation in her community

“This is the only planet we have, and I think it’s really important that we honor that,” Campbell said.

Cruz Chavez and his daughter Violetta waited in line at the farmers market hoping to score native fruit trees such as pawpaws, ser-

vice berries or persimmons.

Chavez plants a tree each year with his kids for Arbor Day

“The tree kind of gets to grow with them. I think they get really excited seeing it get a little bigger every year,” Chavez said.

Since Violetta is learning about how trees help the environment in school, her father Cruz said she’s “obsessed” with planting trees Including this year’s Arbor Day tree, and her favorite, the sycamore.

“I like the color when the bark comes off. I think it’s really cool,” she said.

A local climate solution

Arbor Day’s roots began in Nebraska in the 19th century and has since grown into a globally-observed day of conservation.

For more than 50 years, the Arbor Day Foundation’s mission has been to help communities plant, nurture and celebrate trees.

“We talk a lot about trees

and the messaging we sometimes forget is it’s not about the trees, it’s about the people,” said Eric North, program manager for urban forestry at the Arbor Day Foundation.

North said trees can enhance quality of life. They improve water and air quality and can reduce the impacts of increasing severe weather caused by climate change like heat in the summer and wind in the winter

“We feel very strongly and passionately that trees are really part of a big solution to help improve the lives of people living in communities, to help improve things that might be negatively impacting the climate,” he said.

North said as the threats of climate change intensify the Arbor Day Foundation has heard from more people and organizations who want to implement the solution of planting trees. He helps those folks understand when, what and how to plant.

The city of Columbia has participated in the Arbor Day Foundation’s Tree City USA program for 30 years, Schmittel said. To qualify participating cities must observe Arbor Day, have a tree board or forestry department and commit a minimum $2 per capita annual investment in trees. Schmittel said the city of Columbia spends more than $5 per capita on trees each year Bare root seedlings like those cultivated at the state tree nursery and handed

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