Release
CHANDLER – Jalen Milligan, from Chandler has been awarded $20,000 as one of 20 exceptional young student-athletes honored in the Foot Locker Scholar Athletes Program. For the sixth consecutive year, Foot Locker Foundation, Inc. is recognizing students who demonstrate academic excellence and exemplify strong leadership skills both in sports and within their communities. Jalen will join the Foot Locker class of 2017, which was selected from a highly competitive pool of 37,000 applicants.
“The Foot Locker Scholar Athletes Program celebrates and honors outstanding students like Puneet who have taken the skills they’ve acquired through sports and applied them to excel academically and become leaders within their communities,” Richard A. Johnson, Chairman & Chief Executive Officer of Foot Locker, Inc. said. “We recognize the tremendous potential of our 20 winners and are deeply committed to providing unique educational opportunities to empower today’s youth to succeed.”
Jalen’s impressive athletic involvement includes varsity track and field, varsity softball, USA track and field, Junior Olympics, and competitive dance. Jalen was the first girl to qualify for her state track meet in a sprint, a hurdle, a throw, and a jump. Jalen also has a deep sense of engagement in her community and she volunteers with several organizations. She helps people gain access to free eye exams, she volunteers with a transitional home for women, and she’s organized free track clinics. She also started a program, called the Exchange Zone, where people donate new or used sports equipment and she gives it to kids who can’t afford equipment, don’t have it, or lost it in extraordinary circumstances (a fire or displacement, for example.) Jalen aspires to run track professionally as a heptathlete, and she wants to study exercise science in the Wichita State Honors Program.