This week, our senior spotlight is taken by Concord’s very own, Riley Adams. Many of her friends and peers would describe her as kind, courageous, and a leader. Riley has impacted many individuals in the community, which is why we are honored to shine the spotlight on her.
Riley has attended Concord since she was in kindergarten. Her earliest memory takes place with a lifelong friend, Madisyn Barrett. Adams says, “We were on the way home from school on the bus. We would sit close to each other, but not with each other the first couple weeks of school. Then, one day, Madi’s seat was filled, and she had to come sit next to me. That is when the friendship began.”
In her time here, Adams has participated in many extracurricular activities. Right now, she is part of Student Council, Quiz Bowl, the Vice President of the National Honors Society, and plays multiple sports. Her favorite extracurricular is sports. Adams is a four-sport athlete: she plays basketball, softball, runs track, and runs cross country. Her favorite is cross country, in which she has succeeded with numerous achievements.
One of her many cross-country achievements happened this year. Adams visited Florida to compete in the National Cross Country Meet. During this meet, she earned all-American honors. Throughout her running career, her coach has been Mr. Jursek. He shares her accomplishments from the past cross-country seasons: “She was the captain of the team this year and showed great leadership. She was all-conference for two years; she has been a part of the state qualifying cross country teams; she was all regional; she qualified for the national meet in AAU and earned all-American honors, finishing 18th.” Mr. Jursek was then asked about his favorite thing about her on the athletic side. He responded, “just her hard work and determination to be better at everything she does; she’s very determined and resilient.”
Adams shares what her plans are after her journey in high school comes to an end. She states, “I plan on going to college. Two colleges want to recruit me for cross country, but I do not know if I want to run cross country in college. I want to go to Michigan State and major in marine biology.”
Adams shares the inspiration in her life; she proudly states, “My parents.” She then explains why: “They push me, motivate me, and they are always there to support me through everything I have been through.”
Adams shares what her free time looks like: “I like hanging out with friends; I like spending time with my family and hanging out with my pet tortoise, Rico. He’s going to get 120 pounds and going to live longer than me. I am going to put him in my will with my children.”
Adams shares a few fun facts about herself. The first one is that her favorite type of music is hip-hop. Another fun fact is that if she could be in one place in the world right now, it would be Peru. She explains, “They have these very pretty rainbow mountains; they have goats in the mountains; they have cool cities, and I feel like it would be cool to explore.”
A lifelong friend, described by Adams as “the love of my life”, Gwen Bulko shares the things she loves about Adams the most: “Riley is one of the best people I have ever met. She is incredibly smart and extremely loyal, and she will stop at nothing to stand up for the people she cares about. She is also not fake, and she will never sugarcoat anything. She is just authentic. She can be blunt, but at least she is honest, which is good.”
Madi Barrett shares her favorite memory with Adams. She says, “It would probably be from two years ago with me. Riley, Gwen, Mya, and I all went to Riley’s house for Christmas to make sugar cookies. We decided to have a flour fight in Riley’s kitchen… It was pretty bad.”
Adams shares one last piece of advice for upcoming freshmen. She says, “Do your work; do not get behind because it will get so hard for you to get caught back up. I did that my freshman year, and now my GPA is screwed forever, so do your work.”
We are honored to be able to have the privilege to recognize Riley for the role model that she has been around the school and how it has impacted many of the students who walk the hallways. We truly thank her for the hard work she has put into her schooling and extracurricular activities at Concord. We wish her the best of luck wherever life takes her and we know she will do great things in life!
