Strange roads led to top spots for Shoemaker students

BY TODD MARTIN

SPECIAL TO THE HERALD

The top Shoemaker High School graduates have walked unusual paths to the top of the Class of 2022.

This year’s valedictorian is Christopher Adkins and salutatorian is Mekaila Vila.

The top-ranked Adkins attended Reeces Creek and Haynes elementary schools, Patterson and Smith middle schools and transferred to Shoemaker High School because he was impressed with the athletics program.

Always an athlete growing up, Adkins jumped into football and powerlifting, was sidelined for a year due to injury and came back his senior year but spent as much time in an afterschool and weekend job as he did in the classroom.

Vila lived her young life in North Carolina, Hawaii and Germany with her military family before settling in Guam where she began high school.

A military move brought the family to Fort Hood and Vila had to adjust from a small, private school where there were 60 students in her class to a large public high school.

“This is the first public school I’ve been to,” she said. “I went from 60 in my class to 600. It was a big change.”

To her credit, she has thrived in the midst of uncertainty.

Her sophomore year — her first in a large, public school was cut short by COVID-19. She spent her junior year as a virtual student and her senior year she has mostly attended Central Texas College as a KISD STEM Academy student.

Still, she played volleyball and soccer, ran cross-country and was part of National Honor Society, Science National Honor Society and Youth Sponsorship at Shoemaker High.

Shoemaker High School Class of 2022 valedictorian is Christopher Adkis and salutatorian is Mekaila Vila. Graduation is set for 9 a.m. Friday, May 27 at the Bell County Expo Center.

“It was definitely relieving,” she said of finding out her No. 2 rank. “I’ve been working toward it since sophomore year. My counselor here told me I had the potential to be high up in the class, so I started to work toward that.”

She plans to continue studying locally, attending Texas A&M University Central Texas to pursue a degree in computer science.

“Overwhelming and underwhelming,” is how Adkins described his feel- ings when he found out he was ranked at the top of his class. “It’s a huge accomplishment. I put in the effort, but I still have more to do.”

While many of his peers went virtual in the middle of their high school experience, Adkins remained on campus face-to-face.

He took numerous AP classes and chose to continue taking academic core classes even when he satisfied the requirements for graduation.

Even working a full academic load and competing with the powerlifting team, this school year he has worked at Cavender’s Boot City, often logging 40 hours after school and on weekends.

He plans to attend Texas State University and study human resources management with the intention of staying with the western wear retailer. “I like the ompany and want to keep working there,” he said.

Shoemaker High School graduation is set for 9 a.m. Friday, May 27 at the Bell County Expo Center.