Suffolk’s Betsy Pollard recently earned the attention of the Hampton Roads Sports Commission due to her leadership at school, community service and the character she has developed through participating in athletics.

The 14-year-old Isle of Wight Academy student is one of three local Amateur Athletic Union Junior Olympic athletes that the commission will award with $500 at the Celebration of Athletes Ceremony at Norfolk State University on Aug. 3 during the 2015 AAU Junior Olympic Games.

“I was just really excited when I got it,” Betsy said.

The $500 represents the commission’s Jack Ankerson, You Can Do It! Award. The three awards to be handed out are in honor of Ankerson, who was the Hampton Roads Sports Commission’s first executive director.

A press release from the commission noted Ankerson’s “longtime involvement in sports in the Hampton Roads area along with his charisma, hard work and dedication to everything he is involved with, is nothing short of admirable!”

Applicants for the awards had to be 12 to 17 years old, supply a copy of their school transcripts, complete a 500-word essay and respond to various questions on previous AAU Junior Olympic Games participation.

They also had to list which sports they play, share details about their community service and extracurricular activities, share information about jobs/internships and submit two letters of recommendation.

Betsy’s qualifications stood out from among the various applicants.

“We were very excited for her,” Betsy’s mother, Lou Pollard, said, speaking for herself and her husband, Bill Pollard.

The essay that Betsy wrote had to answer the following question: “How have sports contributed to your character development?”

“I guess that I’ve played a lot of sports when I was little, and I’ve changed,” Betsy said. “All around I’ve learned different things from the different sports that helped me in the sports that I do now, and I figured that I had good stuff to write, so why not give it a shot?”

She wrote about what she has learned from participating in dance, gymnastics, basketball, swimming and running.

She stated that she believes basketball has contributed to her character the most, helping her to build confidence, learn good sportsmanship and work as a team member.

What Betsy has done as a runner in the past two years has most notably demonstrated her personal growth.

“I started working out with a running club and decided to make a proposal to my school to start a track team,” she stated in the essay. “After a little research, I discovered cross country would be much easier and less expensive to start at my school. At my urging, the school created a cross country team.”

She has helped lead the new participants on the team, many of which are older than her.

“Being a leader includes taking risks and being confident,” she wrote. “I had to have good communication skills, and learn to deal with a lot of different personalities through this experience. Good character makes people believe in you, which is essential for individual success. All of these sports and my experience playing them added up to make me who I am today.”

Betsy does community service in a variety of ways with and through her church, Ebenezer United Methodist Church. She helps out at soup kitchens and does mission work.

“She just got back from a week-long mission trip in Ohio,” Lou Pollard said. “That was the first time she had been that far and on a mission trip from church.”

In Ohio, she helped rehabilitated people’s homes.

To earn her Girl Scout Silver Award, she will put in at least 50 hours by September making greeting cards for Meals on Wheels recipients. She has recruited children at her church to help her make the cards and explained to them how it can encourage shut-ins.