Emma Dowdy, is one of the graduating valedictorian at THS this year. She is also a part of our girls varsity soccer team. Her two positions are center back and goalie. Dowdy was influenced to play soccer when she was 4-5 years old by her older sister, Leah, who also played for Tunstall.

She is an active student in both Beta and the Student Council Association (SCA) as a Social Chair. Dowdy took an abundance of advanced placement classes with Tunstall and online, while also going to the Piedmont Governor’s School. 

Dowdy will be attending George Mason University in fall with a full tuition . She received the University of Scholars scholarship by applying for an honors college program at GMU and being one of 20 students chosen for this scholarship. She will major in psychology and concentrate in both Cognitive and Behavioral Neuroscience. 

Psychology will be her future major due to a class assignment. “My junior year of high school, we had to write a research paper on ASPD (antisocial personality disorder) in psychology, and I really enjoyed it and liked learning about the brain and how it functions,” said Dowdy.

Dowdy explains why she chose GMU, “I chose George Mason because I loved the campus when I toured and the scholarship was a big bonus,” Dowdy said.

“If I had to tell my freshman self one thing, it would be not to stress so much about school with the smaller grades and enjoy school,” said Dowdy.

Fellow senior John Mills describes and tells why he believes Emma deserves her scholarship. “I’ve known Emma for five years and she’s always been quiet but very straight forward while still being accepting. She is practical and works hard for everything she gets. She takes pride in what she does and is good at everything she does. That’s why she deserves this scholarship as much as she does,” said Mills

Mrs. Elizabeth Kirby describes her view of Emma. “Emma is confident, an enviable amount of confidence she has. She’s highly intelligent. She got a 5 on my AP Bio exam, one of only two kids to do that. She manages to still play soccer and be an SCA officer. She’s fun and she stays upbeat, and she doesn’t stress herself out. She just lets her intelligence and her brilliance shine,” said Kirby.

Emma is planning on preparing for college by spending the last few months here in Danville with her friends and family before heading off to college and starting her new chapter in life.