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Chickasaw High School Teacher surprised with $50,000 Thursday


WPMI - Chickasaw High School Teacher surprised with $50,000 Thursday
WPMI - Chickasaw High School Teacher surprised with $50,000 Thursday
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A local construction teacher was surprised with $50,000 on Thursday.

Mr. Copes, A Chickasaw High-School Teacher inspires students to use their heads, hands, and hearts by building products that improve the lives of others. He had no idea that when he was walking into the school gym on Thursday, he would be receiving a National teacher prize from Harbor Freight Tools.

“Some of the things that the students are working on is making prosthetic legs. The students actually go with me and other adults into Latin America and actually fit amputees with the prosthetics they made,” Copes said.

The money will also be invested into a solar-powered computer lab.

“The kids are going to give this to a community in Honduras that has never had electricity,” Copes added.

One of his students, Amorie Davis-Hicks, said she’s excited to see Copes get this well-deserved award.

“I never expected this to happen, but it is a great opportunity to have,” Davis-Hicks said.

The Alabama State Superintendent even made an appearance Thursday. He said the state already had a commitment to help get the word out about the great things going on at Chickasaw High School.

“There’s one other winner in the state of Alabama, but there are only six I think in the whole country of this magnitude. So you really are, you’re our top winner and you’re representing the whole state of Alabama,” the state superintendent said.

The 2022 Harbor Freight Tools for Schools Prize drew more than 700 applications from 49 states. It included three rounds of judging, each by an independent panel of experts from the industry.

“Three of the administrators here at both Chickasaw Schools and ALDCA the online school, actually encouraged me to do this. I’ve got an advisory board member that’s been after me to do this for the last three or four years and I’ve just been putting it off,” Copes said.

But because he has so many people encouraging him to do it, he won. Copes has only been teaching at Chickasaw High School for two years.


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