Youth of the Year Austin Leathers tries to be a leader in all situations

The gesture is small, but it makes a big impact.

When he calmly talks with younger kids at the north Columbus branch of the Boys & Girls Clubs of the Chattahoochee Valley, 18-year-old Austin Leathers often bends down to look at them eye to eye.

Ronnie Bell, the club’s senior unit director, explained such a compassionate connection enables the child to think, “Hey, he’s not standing over me. He’s giving me his attention, his focus.”

It’s an example of why Austin is the Youth of the Year for the local clubs. He was a finalist the past two years.

“This award shows me that not only can I accomplish my goals but also that I can reach to the stars when I am setting them,” said Austin, a senior at Jordan Vocational High School.

Austin coaches and officiates sports at the club. He also hands out snacks and cleans up.

“He gives without asking why,” Bell said. “That’s a big thing, especially coming from a teenager.”

“I try to be a leader in all situations,” Austin said, “but I don’t have a problem with following when needed.”

Second home

The five branches of the Boys & Girls Clubs of the Chattahoochee Valley combined to serve about 2,500 youth, ages 6-18, during the past year, with the total daily attendance averaging approximately 800, said Rodney Close, the organization’s president and chief executive officer.

For the past 10 years, the club has been Austin’s second home. He routinely is at the north branch each day after school until it closes at 7 p.m.

“Not only is it a place for me to go, but it’s also a place for me to learn from,” Austin said. “Growing up in a single-parent household and having to experience different things, meeting other kids who also have the same environment, they can tell me things and I can tell them things that are more understandable.”

The club also is a blessing for Austin’s mother, Tiffany, who has two other sons, 13-year-old and 11-year-old Aden. They started attending when she was a single mother.

“I always worked two jobs, and Austin stayed at home with the kids (after school), so this is something they get to do as far as play with other children,” said Tiffany, a former waitress and now a licensed massage therapist who has been married for three years.

From nervous to confident

When he first came to the club, Austin said, “I was one of the quiet kids. I was nervous. … When you get more friends, you feel like you’re more open.”

Bell has seen Austin mature during the seven years he has known him.

“He’s definitely more outgoing, in terms of taking initiative and engaging, that social competency,” Bell said. “He’s one of those young men that is very committed, passionate, and he gives his all, and he’s determined to succeed.”

One day at the club, some teens were goofing off while they were supposed to be painting benches. Austin got them back on track. He made it clear they couldn’t play video games or basketball if they didn’t finish their task.

“I just talked to them so they would understand that we should enjoy the time we have here,” he said. “… Just because you don’t want to listen, you’ve got to think about what will happen if you don’t listen.”

Tiffany is grateful the club has lifted Austin’s confidence.

“He’s always been a good kid, so he’s never really gotten in a lot of trouble,” she said. “But he was quiet. He didn’t really try to stand out or anything. Now, he’s learned to talk in front of people.”

Hundreds of people.

‘I have been that kid’

Austin was announced as the Youth of the Year at the annual dinner and awards ceremony Feb. 18 in the National Infantry Museum and Soldier Center, where he shared his personal story about the positive difference the club has made in his life.

“I am one of those who needed the club the most,” he told the crowd. “Born to a 14-year-old girl who had to move out of her mother’s house at the age of 15, my future didn’t have a great start. … I have been that kid who has walked the halls with a fake smile, cried on the inside because I know my father didn't want to be responsible for his actions, held in anger because I have seen my mother cry, held in eyes full of tears because I wanted to protect my brothers from this cruel world.

“I am often asked, ‘How do you stay on the right path?’ Well, I must say through my mother’s teachings and the staff on the other side of the blue doors at the Boys & Girls Club, there is no other path for me but the right path.”

That path includes learning how to set and achieve goals. He became a first lieutenant in the Junior Reserve Officer Training Corps at Jordan and commanded the color guard and drill team. He is president of the school’s Key Club chapter and secretary of his graduating class.

At the Boys & Girls Club, he is president of Keystone, the club’s servant leadership program. Members do community outreach activities, such as volunteering at a homeless shelter and cleaning parks.

Asked how proud she was of Austin when he was announced as the winner out of seven finalists, Tiffany said, “Extremely. Words can’t describe it.”

Her tears certainly did.

Future and legacy

Austin wants to be an aerospace engineer so he can “think about a plane that doesn’t work and take it apart and put it back together and see it take off and fly,” he said.

His college preference is Tuskegee University.

“After going there and meeting the people, I just like the environment,” he said. “It kind of feels like home.”

Just as he has thrived in a predominantly black youth club, Austin, who is white, shrugs off questions about why he wants to attend a predominantly black college.

“I don’t see color; I see the inner,” said Austin, whose stepfather is black. “It’s not what you have on. It’s not how you dress. It’s not how you look. … It’s about how you speak, what you think, how your personality is.”

No wonder Austin chose to conclude his Youth of the Year speech this way:

“My vision for America’s youth is that they will give a helping hand without being asked and without looking for things in return,” he told the crowd. “My club experience has helped me to develop a legacy and a path for many of the younger club youth who look to me as their role model.

“But even more, when I look into the eyes of my 11-year-old brother as he tells everyone that he is going to become the Youth of the Year, it gives me a great boost of momentum and reminds me why the Boys & Girls Club has had a great impact on my entire family. Now that I am 18, active in school, keeping a good grade-point average, and being a positive influence in my brothers’ lives, I will not become a statistic. My great future did start here.”

This story was originally published March 12, 2016 at 4:00 PM with the headline "Youth of the Year Austin Leathers tries to be a leader in all situations."