Mayor Jimmy Gray, council honor student speakers from State of the City

Mayor Jimmy Gray and the Hampton City Council used a ceremonial “spotlight” session to recognize three student speakers who joined the city’s recent State of the City program.

"Tonight we take a moment to reflect on a powerful scene from this past December that captured the spirit of Hampton," Brian Marchese, the city’s Marketing and Outreach Coordinator, told the council as he summarized the students’ remarks. He said the students’ stories reflected themes Mayor Jimmy Gray emphasized in the keynote, including workforce development, education, engagement and equity.

Marchese described the three students by school and project. Marcus Hicks, from Kilgore Gifted Center, presented a capstone on career awareness that examined budgeting, college planning and steps to run a restaurant; Marchese noted Marcus’s stated goal of becoming a chef and restaurant owner. Jaylen Harris of Phoebus High School focused her 8th-grade capstone on substance abuse and peer pressure and helped launch a student podcast to raise awareness. Ava Taylor Tanner, a senior at Bethel High School and a member of the Academy of Law and Public Safety, discussed leadership through mock trials and community partnerships and said she is pursuing law and rehabilitative work.

Mayor Jimmy Gray invited the three students to the dais for recognition and thanked Hampton City Schools leaders who were in attendance, including Dr. Raymond Haynes (superintendent), Dr. Richard Nation (chair of the school board) and principals from the named schools. The council arranged a group photo and recognized that the student presentations aimed to connect classroom work with career and civic pathways.

The session was ceremonial; no formal votes or policy actions were taken on these recognitions. The meeting adjourned after the acknowledgments.