Senior Spotlight: Sydney Folken
Launch the media gallery 1 playerAs the 2017-2018 school year comes to a close, the senior class is preparing to go off on their own adventures, but first we need to put them in the spotlight one final time!
Sydney Leigh Folken was born on September 3, 1999, in Columbus, Nebraska. Her parents are Chuck and Sue Folken. Her siblings include her brother Justin, her sister Ashley, and her sister-in-law Megan. Her family also includes her nieces and nephews: Clayton, Haysten, Bria, and Oaklyn, as well as her cat, Lucky.
The words that describe Sydney are quiet, friendly, and caring, and her biggest pet peeve is procrastination.
Throughout her high school career, Sydney has participated in yearbook, band, choir, FFA, One-Act, and volleyball for four years. She has also participated in journalism and the school dance team for 2 years, student council, basketball, and track for 3 years, and golf her senior year.
Sydney has also been involved in 4-H for 10 years, studio dance for 16 years, and Zion Youth Group for 4 years, and the Leigh Youth Advisory Committee for one year.
With this level of involvement, there’s bound to be many honors and awards. Sydney was part of the East Husker Conference Honor Choir in 2016 and 2017. She also won Student of the Month at Leigh High School in 2016.
This year she has been Senior Class President and has also won 3rd place in Swine Management in State FFA. She’s also been an honor roll student since 2015 to present day.
Her proudest accomplishments, however, were when the Clarkson-Leigh Volleyball team made it to state in 2017, when the Leigh One-Act made it to state all four years that she participated, and when One-Act won state twice.
Sydney’s favorite high school memory was when the volleyball team made it to state. She remembers walking out and seeing the crowd completely full and listening to the crowd go crazy when the Patriots would get a point.
Her future plans are to attend Wayne State or Midland University and to major in Music Education. In 10-15 years, she sees herself living around the Leigh area, hopefully being married, and having kids.
She’d also like to accomplish these 3 goals: graduating college, going back to New York City, and seeing Niagara falls and the Grand Canyon.
Sydney would also love to travel to Tahiti because it’s “super beautiful” and London because she’d like to see Buckingham Palace and Big Ben.
If she ever won the lottery, Sydney says she would donate some of it to help the community of Leigh and would save the rest for future use.
Her favorite hobbies include hanging out with friends, playing cards, playing with her nieces and nephews, and listening to music.
Her other favorites include: the T.V. shows The Royals and The Voice, the songs “These Days” by Rudimental and “Drops of Jupiter” by Train, the sports team Nebraska Cornhuskers, the restaurant Olive Garden, and her favorite subject which is “anything with Mrs. Sayers.”
As Sydney prepares make some adventures of her own, her advice to the underclassmen is, “High school goes fast, so enjoy every moment. Have fun, try new things, and join as many activities as possible.”