Youth Challenge Holds Last '06 Ceremony
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| Hughes and graduate: One of 200 graduates of the Youth Challenge Program at the |
Georgia National Guard
Public Affairs Office
MACON, Dec. 16, 2006 – The Georgia National Guard-sponsored Youth Challenge Academy at Fort Stewart near Savannah held its final graduation of the year at the City Auditorium with parents and officials packing the house to watch the proceedings.
One of two ceremonies the Fort Stewart campus holds during the year, more than 200 former “at-risk” youth walked the stage, wearing gray fatigues beneath their graduation robes and accepted their YCA diplomas.
Special guest speaker for the year-end event was Col. James R. Tinkham of the National Guard Bureau in Washington. Tinkham, a Vietnam veteran and a 1971 graduate of the Army Aviation program, heads the bureau’s Office of Athletics and Youth ChallenNGe Program. He also is responsible for federal oversight of the Guard’s STARBASE Program and all National Guard military athletic competitions.
Also present at the graduation was State Rep. All Williams of Liberty County. Williams, who hails from Midway near Hinesville, presented a diploma and his congratulations to a graduate from his district.
Tinkham and Williams were joined by Lt. Gen. David B. Poythress, Georgia’s Adjutant General, and Maj. Gen. Terry Nesbitt, Georgia Army Guard commander; and Brig. Gen. Larry Ross, commander 78th Troop Command in Decatur.