OCEAN VIEW HIGH SCHOOL:

Kevin Edwards

For Kevin Edwards, the past four years have had their ups and downs.

After sustaining a sports-related injury his sophomore season and finally beginning to gain full strength by his senior season, the track-and-field runner sprained his neck and tweaked his lower back in a car accident in mid-March.

Edwards, 19, vividly recalls running the 300-meter hurdles at league finals mere weeks after the accident as the most memorable point of high school.

Though Edwards didn’t beat his time as he’d hoped, he thought to himself, “This isn’t about the hurdles in this race; this is about all the other hurdles.”

As a representative, then chairman for the Huntington Beach Youth Board, Edwards was responsible for, among other things, spearheading a $600 senior scholarship fund and was nominated three times for a Golden Hawk award for his service to the city.

Edwards will attend Golden West College in the fall and aspires to get his teaching credential in political science from Cal State Long Beach.

— Kathryn Watson