Recent headlines show SCISA valedictorians, district's new theme

WILSON HALL, TSA LEADERS SHINE IN CLASS OF 2026

Sumter's two largest private schools - Wilson Hall and Thomas Sumter Academy - had a total of three valedictorians in the Class of 2026, and all departed recently for college with goals to become doctors.

TSA's Aiden Steele-Allen and Wilson Hall co-valedictorians Muskaan Judge and Mary Ellen Thorne were tops in their classes, earned all A's throughout high school and each received the Palmetto Fellows Scholarship that goes to top-performing high school graduates in South Carolina staying in state for college.

At Thomas Sumter, Steele-Allen ranked No. 1 in a class of 41 students in 2025-26 with a 5.28 weighted GPA.

His extracurricular activities included three sports at TSA (wrestling, football and track and field). In wrestling, Steele-Allen won the state championship in the heavyweight division in the South Carolina Independent School Association, or SCISA.

In the classroom, he took Advanced Placement Calculus at TSA, was in honors classes in his core subjects and participated in dual enrollment where he earned 30 credit hours for college.

Steele-Allen has now started at Clemson University, majoring in biology on a pre-dental track.

Wilson Hall had co-valedictorians in 2025-26 for the first time in recent memory in Judge and Thorne. Both had the same GPA to the third decimal point at 5.202 on a weighted scale, and school administrators said they felt both deserved the honor. The school's graduating class was 62 students.

Regarding extracurricular activities, Judge played tennis for two years in high school. Outside of school, she loves art to include drawing and painting.

Judge also enjoys Indian Bollywood Dancing, she said. It is a fusion of all various types of Indian dances.

She took nine Advanced Placement courses at Wilson Hall, she said.

The school does not offer dual enrollment but instead focuses on its more than 20 AP course offerings for students to earn potential college credits while still in high school. Judge has about 18 credit hours earned as she now begins at University of South Carolina in the Honors College.

At USC, she plans to major in biology and is on the pre-med track.

Thorne's extracurricular activities included three sports (cross-country, swimming and track and field), serving as team captain in two of them.

She loved being a "distance runner" in cross country and placed ninth in the state as a junior and 11th as a senior, she said.

Last school year, Thorne was named the Wilson Hall Female Athlete of the Year and was also awarded the prestigious SCISA 2026 Bill Simpson Female Scholar Athlete Award for the 3A classification for achievement in academics and athletics.

She took 12 advanced placement courses, primarily in her junior and senior years.

Thorne is now in the Honors College at Clemson. With her high school AP courses, she earned 47 college credit hours, but given her major and other factors, Thorne carries about 15 into college, she said. She plans to major in biochemistry on a pre-med track.

DISTRICT HOLDS BACK-TO-SCHOOL RALLY, UNVEILS NEW THEME

Sumter School District kicked off the new school year - which began on Aug. 4 for students - with a spirited Back-to-School Rally on July 28, where new Superintendent Gerald Gary unveiled this year's theme.

Gary is an accomplished hometown product who has now returned home as the district's new leader.

A 1994 Sumter High School graduate, he served 28 years in K-12 public education to include 20 as a principal before Sumter school board unanimously voted for him as the district's new superintendent in March.

Along the way and while serving in Lexington-Richland School District Five in the last decade, the South Carolina Association of School Administrators twice named Gary as school principal of the year - once at the middle-school level and once at the high-school level. To date, he is the only administrator in the state to win both honors.

In his opening remarks, Gary told all district employees that when he was a student here, all staff from top to bottom invested in him and helped change his life and put him on a trajectory to success.

Therefore, he emphasized to all current staff "that their voice matters," and that is why attendance at the welcome rally was required for all. An estimated 2,200 employees were on hand at Sumter County Civic Center.

Gary added the local district's students could be future engineers, electricians, architects, astronauts and business owners, among other careers.

He emphasized that they need people who believe in them to succeed and called district staff to that role.

That led directly to Gary unveiling his theme for 2026-27.

"As we begin this year," he said, "our theme is simple: One standard. Excellence.

"One standard, and anything else is unacceptable. Not excellence one semester. Not excellence when someone is watching. Not excellence during an evaluation. Not excellence when the board is here. Excellence every day.

"Every moment, every minute, every classroom, every playoff game, every stadium, every theater, every bus stop. Excellence every day, and together we will win."

Mixed throughout the rally, various members of the district's leadership team to include Gary announced teacher and staff award winners for the new 2026-27 school year.

The two biggest awards were district Teacher of the Year, which went to Alice Drive Elementary's Lauren Hansen, and a new award named the Superintendent's Award of Excellence to recognize a non-instructional, classified employee who consistently demonstrates exceptional service, dedication and has made a meaningful impact on the district. The winner was longtime district employee Arella Oxendine of Cherryvale Elementary. She serves in a dual role as a school bus driver and a paraprofessional.