Local students inauguration bound

Two area students are looking forward to what promises to be a monumental event in their lives.

Olivia Walthall, a George Washington High School sophomore, and Gavin Hermann, a ninth-grader at Hargrave Military Academy, are heading to Washington, D.C., for Barack Obama’s inauguration.

Both students can credit their historic opportunity to joining different leadership programs when they were in middle school.

Walthall’s invitation had its beginnings when she was nominated to participate in the Congressional Youth Leadership Council.

Through the council, she has received invitations to several events and spent 10 days in Washington, D.C., during a congressional session.

The inauguration invitation was the best, however.

“The invitation came last April in a UPS box, and I screamed,” Walthall said. “I am excited. It’s a once-in-a-lifetime kind of opportunity, and I’m really, really excited.”

Witnessing history

When Hermann was invited to join the People to People organization during middle school, he didn’t know that would eventually snag him an invitation to Obama’s inauguration.

But it did, and Tuesday will find him close enough, hopefully, to watch the swearing-in and inaugural speech.

“I’m excited,” he said Friday. “It’s going to be a historic event and there will be a lot of people there.”

This isn’t the first time Gavin, son of Dr. Mark and Wendy Hermann, has been on trips with the organization. His first trip was to California and last November, he traveled to Denver for a Global Youth Forum sponsored by People to People.

Gavin was scheduled to fly out of Raleigh-Durham International Airport on Saturday and will be picked up in Washington, D.C., by members of People to People. The group, founded by former President Dwight D. Eisenhower, will stay in a hotel in Herndon and has a long list of activities before and after the actual inauguration, including a meeting with Eisenhower’s granddaughter.

The fun won’t end after the inauguration, though. Gavin also gets to attend a People to People Inaugural Ball Tuesday evening.

Wendy Hermann said the trip to the inauguration was set up before the election was even held and her and her husband had decided Gavin would go whoever won the election.

“It’s a historic event, whichever side of the fence you are on,” she said.

‘A huge plus’

Walthall’s mother, Joyce Perez, had the important responsibility of driving her daughter up Saturday to the hotel in Sterling where she and the rest of the participants in the Youth Leadership Council will be staying and then picking her up again on Wednesday.

Walthall will be attending a full line of events, beginning with an opening night reception.

Keynote speakers during the conference include Gen. Colin Powell, former Vice President Al Gore and Archbishop Desmond Tutu, as well as presidential historian Doris Kearns Goodwin and journalist Lisa Ling. Conference debates will feature political analysts from both political parties and inaugural scholars.

On Inauguration Day, the students in the Youth Leadership Council will have private access to the Smithsonian Institution on the National Mall, witness the actual inauguration and inaugural parade and visit several monuments and museums.

The conference will culminate in a black-tie gala inaugural ball.

Like most mothers, leaving her daughter in the big city worries Perez a little.

“I really wanted to stay close by in case something happens, but there is no place to stay,” she said.

Perez said her daughter is good about staying in touch, though, by phone and texting.

Walthall has been told that the group will be using public transportation and to expect heightened security.

She said deciding what to wear is a “good question.”

Perez said that the instructions dictate business casual for all events but imagines jeans and a sweatshirt will be the dress for the actual inauguration.

To attend the conference cost $2,380 because of the curriculum involved, Perez said.

Walthall said she would have participated even if a Republican had been elected president.

“But because Obama won, it’s a huge plus,” she said.