Submitted by, Lloyd Brown Commander, American Legion Post 0032
The Dillon American Legion, Post 0032 held a dinner on Thursday, February 04, 2016 to honor the young men who had attended the Palmetto State program last June.
The Boys that attended the Palmetto Boys State were Conner Hamilton, Dillon Christian School; Austin Moody, Dillon High School; Daniel Hamilton, Dillon High School; Jonathan Anderson, Latta High School; and Aaren Hyatt, Latta High School.
The School’s Counselors and the Boy’s parents were invited to attend the celebration. Each of these young men was presented with Certificate of Participation for attending Boys State.
The Palmetto Boys State program was held at Anderson University in Anderson South Carolina. While at Anderson University these young men got to meet some of our state political representatives and our Governor, Nikki Haley.
They also got to run for mock government offices from local through the state government level. This was an opportunity for them to see a lot of the long hours and hard work required to run for a political office, and even then you might not win.
To be selected to be a participant at Boys State at Anderson University the boys were selected by their High School to be interviewed by a committee from the American Legion. The members of the committee judged the candidates on how well they recited the Pledge of Allegiance to the flag of the United States of America; then they were asked 10 questions each about the local, state and federal government.
A lot of these questions were rather difficult. All of these young men stated that they felt that being at Boys State had helped make them more outgoing and they had developed more confidence in themselves. They also stated that they had developed new friends that they would continue to keep in touch with.
All of the boys stated that they were happy that they were chosen to get to attend Boys State and that they would recommend this program to all other boys and they thanked the American Legion for providing this opportunity to them