Youth Policy Advocacy Award Previous Recipients

2024: Cole Ramsey

Cole Ramsey is an 18 year old Senior at Western Boone Jr. Sr. High School, in rural Indiana. Cole will be his high school classes valedictorian with the highest GPA in school history. He’s actually partnering with Wabash College to have a hybrid schedule during his senior year. He is involved in many clubs and organizations such as national honor society, key club, chess club, and student government. He also will be a fourth year football and golf athlete.

Cole also has a job at a local restaurant, Noah Grants, which he works on weekends. He has also been one of the youngest interns to work for our state senators in Indianapolis the past two summers.

On top of that Cole created a Youth Advocacy and Leadership council in our local county. He with the support of a local businessman has created a panel of today’s youth from our three county community schools to discuss student issues with local and state government. Within this group one particular issue Cole has been focused on is mental health issues in our schools and lack of local, state, and federal funding to support students with mental health awareness and needs. Cole is currently writing a bill with State Senators to get more funding into our schools to support counseling for our students. This push has come out of Cole and his classmates losing several schoolmates to teen suicide.