Fran Weems
Kealakehe High School track standout Fran Weems says, "I'm not your typical foster kid."
She is right.
Not too many foster kids — or any kids for that matter — win three state championships in the 200-meter dash and also win the 100 and 400 as a senior, as she did three weeks ago.
Not too many foster kids also place in the top four in the Big Island Interscholastic Federation cross country championships, as she did her junior year.
Not too many foster kids do those things and also letter three years in varsity soccer, as Weems has done.
Cross country, soccer, track and field Grade-point average: 3.8 College: California
And not too many foster kids are as accomplished in athletics, graduate with a cumulative grade-point average of 3.8, help the community with clean-ups and feeding the homeless, and also talk to other foster children about overcoming adversity.
Kealakehe
Weems said she is not ashamed of her past, of bouncing from foster home to foster home since she was eight years old.
"I owe a lot to my history," she said. "It's made me who I am today."
Weems will attend California-Berkeley, where she plans to walk on to the track team.
