Coast teens win state Boys & Girls Club top honors

Cayla Derbigny, bullied at a younger age, wants to be a civil rights attorney. Joshua Martin Rivera, once shy, wants to be a pilot.

Both teenagers are working toward their goals, and that’s part of the reason these Coast residents have brought home the two top state awards in the Boys & Girls Clubs of America scholarship program.

Derbigny is the Mississippi Youth of the Year. Rivera is the Military Youth of the Year.

They each received a $5,000 scholarship at awards ceremonies Feb. 17 in Jackson. They will vie for scholarship awards of up to $10,000 at regional competition this summer. Regional winners then compete at the national level for even more scholarship money to be awarded in September.

Derbigny is a longtime member of the Boys & Girls Clubs of the Gulf Coast. Rivera is a longtime member of the Keesler Air Force Base Youth Program.

At the awards program, Derbigny talked about being a victim of bullying and later battling Grave’s disease. Rivera said he had been a shy kid who kept to himself but said the youth program helped him develop leadership qualities.

‘The whole package’

Derbigny is now a student at the University of South Mississippi.

“Cayla is the whole package,” said Keva Scott, chief executive officer of the local Boys & Girls Club program. “She has a purpose and she is living it out.”

Derbigny was a junior staffer last summer. She has tutored young girls and assisted club leaders.

“She’s sincere, she makes good grades and has good manners,” Scott said.

Derbigny had been bullied during middle school, Scott said.

“In coming to the club, she was able to get the tools and the information she needed to navigate that situation and to hold her head up high when others were calling her names.”

Derbigny, daughter of Clark and Connie Derbigny, competed against 18 other teens.

Second top award for Rivera

Rivera, a Biloxi High student, wants to attend the Air Force Academy and become a pilot.

This is the second consecutive year he’s won the state’s top military youth award.

He’s the son of Martin and Christine Rivera, who both retired from the Air Force.

Josh Rivera has been attending the youth program at Keesler since he was in kindergarten.

“I never thought about awards when I started as a kid,” he said. “I’m very thankful for the opportunities and the scholarship money.”

His mother said she wasn’t surprised he won.

“He is involved with the community, is very focused and we know that he has been working very hard all along,” Christine Rivera said.

Keesler has honored him as base youth of the year, she said. He is a squadron commander in JROTC and is a section leader in the Biloxi High varsity band, where he plays the saxophone.

‘Inspiring and enabling’

The nationwide scholarship program encourages young people to achieve their potential.

“Cayla and Joshua, as well as all Youth of the Year nominees, are living proof that Boys & Girls Clubs across the country are inspiring and enabling young people to achieve great futures,” Jim Clark, Boys & Girls Clubs Association president and CEO, said in a news release.

Two other Mississippi Coast young people were nominated for awards.

Elizabeth D. Goodman of the Naval Construction Battalion Center youth center in Gulfport is planning a career in nursing.

Morgan G. Williams of the Boys & Girls Clubs of Jackson County aspires to be a public relations specialist.

This story was originally published February 24, 2017 at 5:00 AM with the headline "Coast teens win state Boys & Girls Club top honors."