Carson Carere Highlights Scholarship Efforts for Lamar Rotary

Judy Turpin, Carson Carere, Karen Ketcham

Carson Carere, a former Lamar High School senior and 2021/2022 Colorado DECA State President, was guest speaker at the Lamar Rotary Club’s weekly meeting this past Thursday, July 21^st.  An accomplished student and athlete, Carson is a Boettcher Scholarship recipient who will pursue a finance degree at the University of Colorado in Boulder.

While attending high school, he served as the student body president and was a concurrent enrollment student at Lamar Community College, earning an associates degree.  He has been very active in DECA and attributes that membership and his baseball career at LHS as two of the main attributes that allowed him to attain his leadership position within the state DECA association as well as earn his Boettcher Scholarship.

He says he received help in his DECA commitment from his older brother, listening to him prepare for his own DECA speech at the state level.  “When I heard the presentation and was able to witness first-hand the involvement of so many students from around the state during the meeting at the Broadmoor, I knew, then, that this was something I wanted to pursue,” he told the gathering.

His involvement paid off.  Carere said his team raised $10,000 on a state level for Mental Health Colorado, volunteered 12,000 hours of various community service and raised 26,000 pounds of food items for families from around the state.  He offered thanks to teacher Jenna Randle and Coach Forney for their mentorship to him personally and to the local DECA organization.  “I doubt I wouldn’t be here if it wasn’t for my involvement with DECA,” he said, adding he learned the value of being resilient from his baseball career at LHS.

By Russ Baldwin