Whiz Kid: Divine Child's Valedictorian Hopes to Become a Judge

Name: Erika Giroux

Age: 18

School:

Accomplishment: Giroux, who was named valedictorian after a succession of semesters ranked as the school's No. 1 student in terms of grades, knew that she would be valedictorian. But the fact that it wasn’t a surprise doesn’t matter.

“I’m so pleased,” she said. “It was a lot of hard work.”

Giroux is a lifelong Dearborn Heights resident who spent her entire educational career in the Divine Child system. She said the single biggest factor in her success was the setting of the school in and of itself.

“My teachers really encouraged success at all levels,” she said. “Working hard was stressed; and they were really helpful to me.”

Key to awesomeness: Giroux said her favorite classes are anything in the social studies realm–American history, world history and government. However, she also said she enjoys math.

Giroux said attending school at Divine Child afforded her many opportunities for activities and field trips, inlcuing membership on the student council and National Honor Society, as well as taking trip to Stratford, Ontario to see William Shakespeare’s “As You Like It.”

Now that she has graduated, Erika Giroux will continue working at the Henry Ford, and preparing to head to Wayne State University in the fall. At Wayne, she intends to earn a bachelor’s degree in history or political science. But it doesn’t end there.

“I really want to go to law school,” she said. “I think it would be great to be in private practice in family law, but ultimately, I want to be a judge.”

Erika Giroux is the recipient of Wayne's "University Scholarship," which covers tuition, room and board, and books for four years.

It’s June, and graduation is in the air. That means Dearborn Patch is going to highlight each valedictorian on Wednesdays all month.

But this week will be out final valedictorian. That doesn’t mean we’re going to stop seeking out great students to appear in this feature, and if you know a student who is working had to make the grade at school–or in life–we’d like to know about it. Everyone deserves a little attention, and we want to tell these stories.

Email your Whiz Kid nominations to Editor Jessica Carreras at Jessica.carreras@patch.com. Please include the name, age, school, achievement and key to awesomeness, as well as a photo. Then come back every Wednesday for our Whiz Kid spotlight. You never know who may be smiling at you from the computer screen.