On Monday, U.S. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan announced the 49th class of U.S. Presidential Scholars, which acknowledged the accomplishments of 141 high school seniors in the arts or in academics.
One of those 141 individuals could be your neighbor if you live in Manhattan Beach. That’s because ballerina Daisy Jacobson was among those selected. She’ll be heading to Washington, D.C. in June for the Presidential Scholars National Recognition Weekend. She will attend the Medallion Ceremony on June 16 and perform at the KennedyCenter the following day. She will meet state representatives on June 18.
“My journey to becoming a presidential scholar began in October when I decided to apply to the YoungArts competition,” said Jacobson, who attends ChadwickSchool in PalosVerdesPeninsula. “The year before, I did a local arts competition called Spotlight Awards and became a semi-finalist. The people in charge of Spotlight emailed me the link to the YoungArts website and told me I should apply since I would skip the initial round of the competition and head straight to the semi-final round due to my accomplishment with the Spotlight Awards.”
It proved to be good advice. After sending in a video Jacobson was notified that she was one of 152 artists (in various fields) selected from among 10,000 applicants to compete at YoungArts. After becoming a YoungArts winner she was nominated to apply for Presidential Scholar. At about that time she learned that she’d been accepted into Julliard.
It was on her birthday, Jacobson added, that she learned she was one of three dancers from YoungArts to become a Presidential Scholar in The Arts.
“My twin sister came screaming and running into my room to wake me up,” Jacobson said. “I thought I was dreaming. I still cannot believe it. If you had told me this last year at this time I would say that there is no way that it would happen.” ER
