The kid who did the morning announcements every day at Monarch High School in Coconut Creek has also been class president all four years, while serving as the JROTC battalion commander, overseeing 186 cadets.
Lincoln Le is a senior and a leader.
”I just have the ambition to always be involved, to be action-oriented and have a say in everything,” Lincoln told us last November when we featured him in our Students Making A Difference series.
Today I asked him, via FaceTime, how he’s adjusting to his senior year being cut off by the pandemic.
“From always being at school for almost seven to 10 hours per day, now I’m at home 24/7, it’s definitely a game changer,“ Lincoln replied. “I’m not near my friends, not at school doing work, it’s like going from 100 miles per hour slowing down to 10.”
From Coconut Creek to the nation’s capital, Lincoln is going to Georgetown University in the fall, or whenever the pandemic allows college campuses to reopen.
“I just love Washington, DC, and I want to study in politics and hopefully in the end, end up in the White House so I feel being in the heart of the capital is the perfect place to be.”
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He already has his sights set on the presidency of the United States. There is no lack of ambition in this young man, which he credits to the values he learned in JROTC.
“It has definitely shaped me into who I am today and I definitely would not be the type of leader I am, I would not have chased all these goals if it was not for JROTC,” Lincoln said.
He is named after Abe Lincoln and he was once voted most likely to become president, so maybe destiny is at work. In the meantime, he has plenty of quarantine time to contemplate his legacy at Monarch High.
“I want to be known as that person who they went to for help or with any questions or any type of tutoring or anything like that, I just want to be known as the person that was the go-to person, the person that was always there,” Lincoln said.
I asked him if he had advice for fellow seniors who are depressed over the abrupt ending to their high school years.
“Look into your high school career as to what it has been for you rather than what it could have been because we’re going through a pandemic and it’s not normal and it’s OK to be sad, it’s OK to look down sometimes but keep your head up and look forward because there will be an end to all of this,” Lincoln responded. “My biggest advice is to keep looking forward, I told a lot of my senior peers that every road trip has a few bumps in the road and even has an entire detour, it’s not in our control.”
His classmates expect big things from Lincoln in the future. Whatever lies ahead, Lincoln can handle it. That’s what leaders do.
