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Indianapolis Star
2 days ago
- Sport
- Indianapolis Star
New Pal catcher, valedictorian balances baseball with engineering future: 'Just trying to juggle everything'
New Palestine catcher Jackson Kamp watched the pain his grandmother, Debby Fisher, dealt with on a daily basis after undergoing multiple joint replacement surgeries. As a kid, Kamp wanted to study aerospace engineering and design airplanes, but finding a solution to his grandmother's pain sparked his interest in biomedical engineering. Kamp wants to design joint replacements, prosthetics and surgery robots, things that can really make a difference in people's lives. The senior is a dedicated student, valedictorian of his class with a 4.11 GPA. Before he solves the world's problems as an engineer, the Dragons (24-3) backstop will be tasked with slowing down the Guerin Catholic (18-12) offense during Saturday's Class 3A semistate semifinals. "Behind the plate, it definitely helps a lot," Kamp said of his intelligence. "It allows me to see things and study them. It can get me into trouble at the plate sometimes, though, starting to overthink things a little bit, but behind the plate, there's never enough time for that. It lets me make decisions quickly based on what I see. It makes it easy to see patterns. So, when I see the patterns, I know, oh, I need to do this." Balancing academics and athletics was not an easy task for Kamp. There were nights where the senior stayed up until 1 or 2 a.m., after games studying and finishing up homework. Kamp also had to sacrifice his social life to maintain his grades. "Just trying to juggle everything, it's definitely not easy," Kamp said. "My parents were always on me about using my time wisely, because I'm still a teenager and want to have fun with my friends and stuff, but they were like, 'if you want to accomplish this goal, you might have to give up something else.'" "He's probably one of the hardest workers I know," added senior pitcher Rigg Mahurin. "To be able to have his GPA and to be one of the better baseball players on the field, it just takes that much more work. ... He's usually one of the first ones out here, doesn't put his cleats on yet, just goes straight to setting the field up for practice. He's the last one off the field, last one to take reps. He's just that kid to stay after and just put the work in when he knows he needs it." Kamp and Mahurin have developed into a shutdown battery. Kamp relays the calls from coach Shawn Lyons to the pitching staff and the defense. Kamp caught Mahurin's nine-strikeout no-hitter against Cascade in the regional championship. Mahurin has not allowed an earned run over three postseason starts. For the season, Mahurin is 9-1 with a 1.38 ERA and 85 strikeouts over 60⅔ innings. Kamp's experience and ability to process the game keeps him in sync with his coach and pitchers. Lyons trusts his backstop to make the right signals based on what he's seeing from the dugout, and Kamp has the defensive ability to execute all the plays on the diamond. The Anderson commit has a .977 fielding percentage, with nine assists and just five errors in 216 chances. At the plate, Kamp is batting .311 with 19 runs scored, 26 RBIs, seven doubles, one triple and a team-high six home runs. "He's my quarterback for the defense," Lyons said of Kamp. "He'll make sure the pitcher and him are on the same page. He'll let me know, 'hey the umpire is really tight. Or he's giving a ball on the outside or the inside (of the plate).' We're always communicating. "Jackson has been with us since his freshman year. ... They understand our coaches. They understand where we're coming from, and they trust the process." Just two games from the state championship is a familiar place for the Dragons. In 2022-23, they lost in the semistate semifinals to Castle. Last season, New Pal lost in the semistate semis again, this time in extra innings to Class 4A runner-up Mooresville. There's a sting that comes from getting that close to the championship and coming up short. Failure is painful, but New Pal is hoping to build from the experience gained over the past two seasons. "The atmosphere is crazy," Kamp said of the semistate tournament. "So, if you've never been in it, it's surreal. Having that experience just lets you play instead of being all tight because you're like, 'oh, there's a lot of people in the stands right now.'" Follow IndyStar high school baseball Insider Akeem Glaspie on X at @THEAkeemGlaspie and get IndyStar's high school coverage sent directly to your inbox with the High School Sports newsletter. Class 4A at South Bend Riley (Four Winds Field at Coveleski Stadium) Class 4A at Mooresville Class 3A at LaPorte Class 3A at Jasper Class 2A at Oak Hill Class 2A at Castle (at University of Evansville) Class A at Lafayette Jeff (Loeb Stadium)
Yahoo
10-03-2025
- Health
- Yahoo
LGBTQ+ youth in Missouri and Kansas face higher suicide risk
LGBTQ mental health is a concern for youth in Missouri and Kansas (Zachary Linhares / The Beacon). In Missouri and Kansas, almost four in 10 young people who identify as gay or transgender have seriously considered suicide in the past year, and 15% have attempted it. That's according to a new survey by The Trevor Project, which asked 18,000 people ages 13 to 24 across the country questions about issues like depression and anxiety, bullying and access to mental health care. Overall, the survey found that young people in the Midwest reported some of the highest rates of suicidal thoughts and suicide attempts compared to youth in other regions of the country. The survey also found that youth in the Midwest experienced the highest rates of reported physical threats and harm based on sexual orientation and gender identity. 'We must be careful to reiterate that these young people are not prone to higher suicide risk compared to their peers,' said Ronita Nath, vice president of research at The Trevor Project, an organization that focuses on suicide prevention and crisis intervention in the LGBTQ+ community. 'But rather, they're placed at higher risk because of how they're mistreated and stigmatized, including through anti-LGBTQ+ politics.' Nath said results from the survey, conducted in 2024, are meant to offer policymakers, educators and other organizations a road map for how to change the environment. 'By reporting these numbers, we aim to highlight the ongoing risks LGBTQ+ youth face,' Nath said, 'and reinforce the need for policies and support systems that protect them from these harmful experiences.' In Missouri and Kansas, where anti-transgender legislation has been a central focus in the Republican-dominated legislatures, anxiety and depression are top concerns, according to the survey results. Among Missouri respondents, 69% — including three-quarters of people who identify as transgender or nonbinary — reported experiencing symptoms of anxiety. In Kansas, 65% reported anxiety symptoms. In both states, almost half of young people said they had experienced depression. Jennifer Mahurin, a therapist who treats LGBTQ+ patients in the Kansas City area, has seen an uptick in anxiety since the November election, and since President Donald Trump began handing down executive orders aimed at limiting transgender rights. 'The messages that are coming into our schools, into our homes, into wherever we are,' Mahurin said, 'are impacting everybody.' Mahurin sees clients trying to deal with the anxiety in a variety of ways, from doomscrolling on social media, to looking for answers, to just tuning out. Her goal is to help them find healthy ways to cope. 'I'm usually checking in with them to see what is working for them, what isn't working and where do they want to see the change,' Mahurin said. Talking to a trained therapist can help with anxiety and depression, but therapy is not always an option. Appointments, especially with a therapist who takes insurance, can be hard to find. And in some rural areas, options are even more limited. According to The Trevor Project survey, more than half of young people in Missouri who wanted mental health care didn't get it. Of that group, 47% said they didn't get care because they couldn't afford it. The survey found that 46% of young people in Kansas who wanted care didn't receive it, 43% because they couldn't afford it. In recent years, anti-transgender bills have been ubiquitous in Kansas and, to an even greater extent, Missouri. Last month, Kansas legislators passed a law outlawing gender-affirming care for Kansans younger than 18. The ban applies to gender-affirming medical care, including puberty blockers, hormone replacement therapy and surgeries, and also targets social transitioning, which critics say could even prohibit teachers from using a student's preferred pronouns. In Missouri, legislators have introduced dozens of anti-transgender bills, including several that would make permanent a previously adopted ban on gender-affirming care for minors, which is set to expire in 2027. Other bills would extend the state's ban on transgender children playing sports for teams that reflect their gender identity, also set to expire in 2027. The bill closest to the finish line that would repeal the sunset provisions of those laws is sponsored by Sen. Lincoln Hough, a Greene County Republican. He did not return a request for comment. Other bills being considered in Missouri this year include restrictions about what gender people are allowed to list on state IDs, bathroom bans that require people to use a bathroom that matches their gender assigned at birth and a bill that would strip protections against discrimination for transgender people. State Rep. Wick Thomas, a Democrat who represents parts of Jackson County, said Missouri Republicans are 'trying to remove trans people from existence.' 'I think the next step, once there's no legal trans person,' Thomas said, 'is to then go after the gay community as well.' Thomas, the state's first nonbinary legislator, understands the toll the constant barrage of anti-LGBTQ+ legislation has on people. They have met with dozens of LGBTQ+ young people since getting to Jefferson City. Telling them there's little they can do to stop the bills, Thomas said, is one of the toughest things they've had to do. But Thomas will continue to try. 'I want to be sure that I am not only standing up for my district and my constituents,' they said, 'but also for my 16-year-old self who needed adult support and couldn't find it.' This article first appeared on Beacon: Kansas City and is republished here under a Creative Commons license.
