Inspiration in Every Answer: Q&A Moments from Lee County’s Banquet

The sun was shining for the 2025 Lee County Carson Scholars Awards Banquet as scholars and their guests gathered on Sunday, April 13^th in Fort Myers.  Shari Armstrong, a digital correspondent for Fox 4 News and a native of Southwestern FL, brought the positive energy that made the banquet extra fun.  The Leadership Award was presented to Arthur Lih, inventor of LifeVac, an anti-choking device, for demonstrating leadership through innovative practices and initiation and implementation of creative ideas.

This year’s banquet theme was Soaring to New Heights, a concept that perfectly summarizes not only this year’s Carson Scholars, but the thousands of alumni before them. We aimed to focus on scholars’ amazing contributions to their schools, local communities and the world, while continuing to set new goals for themselves.  Three videos highlighting scholars’ work were shown at the banquet and were introduced by Skylar Muncy, Lexi Klutsarits and Natalia Gonzalez Cabrera.

Additional scholar participants were:

Reef Mertz – led the Pledge of Allegiance

Brynnan Kirkpatrick – delivered the blessing

Emily Feichthaler – musical performance

Reagan Felt, AdiVera Ivanov, Madelyn Debiram – asked questions during the Q&A

Edvin Monroy – introduced Dr. Carson for his keynote address

Scholars were invited to submit questions to be asked of Mr. Lih and Dr. Carson during a special Q&A segment.  Guests learned about setbacks that both men experienced that could have served as roadblocks but instead opened new doors and led to unexpected success, and both shared advice with scholars about pursuing future careers:

“Keep an open mind and find something to do good that helps and takes care of people.  Show dedication and hard work.  Find something that does good and you will do great.” – Art Lih

“Youth is on your side. You are equipping yourself to save lives and there is no better feeling than to save lives.” – Dr. Carson

View photos from the event HERE!