This spring, Marshall County High School graduate Alex Shaverin has been a Paducah Bank Teen of the Week and an Associated General Contractors of Western Kentucky Technical Center Student of the Week. He’s now been named the 2022 Inspiration Award recipient, taking home one of the two awards in the Paducah Bank Teen of the Week scholarship program.
Earlier this month, a six-person committee from The Sun and Paducah Bank chose Shaverin for this recognition and Paducah Tilghman High School senior Dana Hernandez for the Teen of the Year Award. Shaverin joins his older sister, Anastasia Shaverina, in receiving the Inspiration Award, as she won it in 2020.
“Team members at Paducah Bank and here at The Paducah Sun congratulate both students and we want to wish them the best of luck as they graduate and head off to college,” said Bill Evans, The Sun’s publisher, in an announcement video that can be watched online at paducahsun.com.
Shaverin, 18, plans to attend the University of Kentucky in the fall, and to major in mechanical engineering. He has an interest in the biomedical field, and in establishing an engineering firm one day.
“I’m very excited to take on the next step, I guess, in my life to achieve a further career ... but I think overall it came down to a couple of different colleges and UK seemed to be the best option for me with good scholarship opportunities that they offered,” Shaverin told The Sun.
Shaverin and his family emigrated from Russia back in 2015 when he was 12 years old and he has since become fluent in English. He helps out his family with various responsibilities, such as with translating documents. The family came from the city of St. Petersburg and settled in western Kentucky.
He’s the son of Anna Shaverina and Anatolii Shaverin of Benton.
At Marshall County, he played on the school’s boys soccer team. He was involved with student council, Young Americans for Freedom and Interact Club. He’s stayed busy with different jobs, including landscaping work. Shaverin is an AP Scholar as well and attended the Kentucky Governor’s Scholars program last year.
He was named a Paducah Bank Teen of the Week in March. As the Inspiration Award recipient, he will receive a $1,000 scholarship.
“I’m very thankful for an opportunity to get the scholarship,” Shaverin said, adding that it will be a great addition to other scholarship funding to help cover his college-related expenses.
Marshall County held its graduation ceremony for the Class of 2022 on Friday evening. In the weeks before the milestone event, Shaverin described high school graduation as being “bittersweet.”
“I’ve enjoyed every minute in Marshall County, ever since I moved here in sixth grade,” he said.
“ … I’ve felt accepted. I’ve felt nothing less than welcomed. It’s just been overall great. I’ve built amazing relationships with students, teachers, administrators, everything and I truly enjoyed it here, but at some point, there’s always time to move on. I’m excited about my future career and my future in college.”
By: Kelly Farrell
Paducah Bank Teen of the Week Final