UNM STUDENT, ROSWELL NATIVE THRIVES ON COMMUNITY SERVICE

May 27, 2003

UNM STUDENT, ROSWELL NATIVE THRIVES ON COMMUNITY SERVICE

Working with people suits Roswell native Justin Sims perfectly. The University of New Mexico sophomore, who carries a 3.98 GPA, is pursuing a triple major including international management, German and marketing.

“As long as I get to work with people – that’s really all I care about,” he said.

Once Sims graduates, he plans to travel overseas and work for a German auto company like BMW or Mercedes Benz who have manufacturing plants in Germany and also Brazil. If that doesn’t work out he wouldn’t mind working in the area of domestic relations stateside, which is how the triple major comes into play.

“When you go into international management they recommend that you have something else like marketing,” he said. “I figure I’m fairly proficient in the German language and you only need about 24 hours of credit for a second major, so I plan on majoring in all three. I feel I can do that and if I have to stay an extra year, I think it will be well worth it.”

Part of Sims’ motivation is keyed by his Presidential Scholarship, one of the most valuable at UNM. The goal of the Presidential Scholarship Program is to keep the state’s brightest and best students in New Mexico. Presidential Scholarships are awarded to high school seniors in New Mexico based on merit, including grade point average, class rank, College Board scores, personal essays, leadership and community involvement. Scholars have varied ethnic backgrounds and come to UNM from communities all over the state.

“It helped me to hold myself to a higher standard or at least continue that standard I set in high school,” Sims said. “It gives you the motivation to want to do well because if someone cares enough to provide a scholarship for you, I think I should work my hardest to earn it and not be just another number in the system. I’d like to think that I deserve it and earn what I get. It has definitely motivated me to do my best.”

In the meantime, Sims is building his resume working in the community as an independent contractor with the New Mexico State Department of Health, where he is the statewide coordinator for the Youth Development Advisory Council (YDAC). It’s a group he was originally admitted to as a member while at Goddard High School.

Once he made his way to UNM in the fall of 2001, the former coordinator left and Sims was contacted by the YDAC, who thought he would be the best person for the job.

“I was adjusting to a new situation as a college freshman, a new school and then all of a sudden I have this responsibility to be in charge of the YDAC,” he said. “It definitely was a big responsibility, but I just think back to my Presidential Scholarship and that I have to keep my grades up, and more than anything else, it has helped me rise to the occasion and do what needed to be done.”

Sims says the YDAC recruits kids from throughout the state from every different type of background including homeless youth and class valedictorians among others. They have three training sessions a year. The kids’ ages range from 14 to 24, the age group defined as “adolescence” by the State Department of Health. His responsibilities include facilitation, coordination, logistics and everything else that comes up.

“We try and preach diversity,” Sims said. “We train the kids in facilitation skills including everything from giving presentations to dealing with conflict. We also try to train individuals to be advocates for issues they feel are important.

“We’ve had council members go as far as Warsaw, Poland at a World Tobacco Summit. It’s really neat to see the kids get so impassioned about health issues that really matter to them and get out in the community and make a difference.”

Sims didn’t always think he would pursue this career path. His extended family is doctor oriented. Most of Sims’ uncles are doctors, including one who is an orthopedic surgeon for the U.S. Women’s Ski Team, and another uncle who owns his a practice in South Lake Tahoe, Calif. He also has two
cousins who recently passed all their exams and are going to medical school and he says there are two more on the way.

However, Sims seems to be following in the footsteps of his parents, Andrew and Heidi, by steering clear of the medical profession. His father is an electrical contractor who owns Andrews Electric in Roswell, while his mother is the superintendent of recreation for the Roswell Recreation Department.

“I always thought I wanted to be an orthopedic surgeon. It seems like everyone in my family is a doctor,” he said. “I had the opportunity to visit Germany with my school and was able to experience different cultures, interact with people and was able to get that first hand experience. It was awesome. So over the course of one summer I changed what I thought I always wanted to do. I came home and said, ‘I don’t want to be a doctor anymore. I think I’ll go into business.’”

He has always been gifted academically graduating from Goddard High School in 2001 with highest honors, including a 4.5 GPA. As an elementary and mid-school student, Sims maintained straight A’s throughout those school years.

He was a member of the District 4-AAAA All Academic Team, the Key Club, National Honor Society, Who’s Who Among American High School students for all four years of high school, Chief of Police Youth Advisory Council, and Teen Leadership Roswell graduate. Sims was also a two-sport student-athlete, playing basketball and running cross country and still managed to log more than 1,000 hours of community service in high school.

Success has followed Sims to UNM where he is a member of the Dean’s List and the Honor Roll. He was also recently inducted into the National Society of Collegiate Scholars (NSCS), which is by invitation only based upon academic performance. In addition, he is a member of the Phi Eta Sigma fraternity and the National Honor Society.

# # #