Finalists announced in Cowboys Community Captain competition

The Star in Frisco is about to get a lot brighter with the impending visit of enterprising young students from Midland and Odessa.

Five teams of students participating in the Abell-Hanger Foundation’s Students in Philanthropy program have advanced to the finals of the Cowboys Community Captain competition. They will next travel to The Star in Frisco on Nov. 28 to present their community service project ideas to a panel of judges from the Cowboys, Chevron and Abell-Hanger Foundation.

It’s part of a new partnership between the Cowboys and Chevron that is encouraging teamwork between Permian Basin students and nonprofits on service projects that benefit their communities. As part of the initiative, student teams partnered with a local nonprofit to develop proposals for community service projects. The team whose idea wins over a panel at the finals at The Star in Frisco will be named Community Captain. Their nonprofit organization will receive $10,000 from Chevron to implement the Community Captain’s project in the spring.

The five teams advancing to the finals include a group of Legacy High students aiming to make improvements at the Crisis Center of West Texas in Odessa. Their project would create outside and indoor murals at the Center, baby care bags and renovations to the Center’s play room and therapy/conference room.

Another finalist, the Young Women’s Leadership Academy, aims to renovate and rehabilitate facilities used by the Midland Children’s Rehabilitation Center’s equine programs, including its Hippotherapy (“therapy on horseback”) programs.

Meanwhile, Midland High students hope to furnish and equip “The Goodness Studio” for the homeless services nonprofit the Field’s Edge. They are also headed to the Star in Frisco on Nov. 28. According to the students, The Goodness Studio will be a workshop providing space for residents of the Field’s Edge to participate in various hobbies and entrepreneurial ventures, such as leather works, pottery, coffee roasting or woodworking.

A fourth finalist features a group of Permian High students who want to respect local veterans by cleaning the pond at Memorial Gardens. The so-called “Quack & Clean Project,” also a benefit for ducks at the pond, will additionally have students installing a new plaque and planting a Purple Heart Tree (Peltogyne tree) near the pond in partnership with veterans services provider Permian Basin Warriors.

The final finalist in the Cowboys Community Captain competition wants to host a “Field Day” for about 75 patients of the Permian Basin Rehabilitation Center at the UTPB Football Field. A separate student team from Legacy High says many of these patients are typically left out of this event and they want to offer them a way to feel included. Field Day would have a number of fun competitive activities like flag football, an egg relay race, water balloon toss and more.

Jonathan Harshman, public and government affairs advisor for Chevron’s Mid-Continent Business Unit, said colleagues and judges have been inspired by the student proposals and are looking forward to seeing the finalists present in Frisco.

“Their presentations are not only inspiring but encouraging for the future of the Permian Basin,” Harshman said. “Chevron is proud to support an initiative that provides talented young people in our communities with an opportunity to support the critical efforts of our nonprofit organizations.”

In an earlier statement, Abell-Hanger Foundation CEO Mark Palmer lauded the Cowboys Captain Competition for enabling students to “gain real-world experience in thinking through the process of executing a project to benefit their community.”