Eleven months after her son was shot and killed a block from his high school, Kim Pickett visited that school last week to award a scholarship in his honor.
“It was very emotional for me,” she said. “I told them I was there to represent my son and his dreams. I didn’t like standing there speaking, but I did it for him.”
Darryl “Shannon” Pickett, 17, was shot in an alley near Church Street and Dodge Avenue last June. A few days later, classmate Theo David Wright turned himself into the police and was charged with the homicide. Wright has pleaded not guilty.
The $1,000 Darryl Shannon Pickett Scholarship was awarded to Evanston Township High School senior Daniel Kruger, a teammate of Pickett’s on the football team.
The scholarship, created by Pickett’s mother and funded by donations, is a way to keep alive the 17-year-old’s dream of going to college, she said.
“If my son was here, I’d be trying to get him ready for college right now,” she said. “I can’t bring him back. It’s a bad feeling, it’s a real bad feeling, but it makes me feel good to know I could help someone else have their dreams come true.”
The scholarship will be awarded to a senior athlete in need of financial assistance to attend college, the mother said. The usual amount will be $500, but fundraisers wanted to grant a full $1,000 to a student from Pickett’s graduating class.
Kruger, who will attend the Milwaukee School of Engineering next year, said he appreciated the significance of the award.
“I knew him and I know how big a loss it is to not have him around anymore,” the former football team captain and MVP said. “It was a pretty touching moment, not only for the two of us, but everyone there was pretty choked up.”
Pickett motivated the other players and was one of the hardest working players on the team, “always with a smile on his face,” Kruger said. Family members stressed that Pickett was not a gang member, but a committed student excited for college.
The scholarship is one of several recent efforts to honor Pickett.
A memorial will be held on the ETHS football field on June 28, the day he was killed.
Pickett’s cousin, Jamal Davis, wrote a song and is circulating the CD to discourage violence.
“The message to the kids is we need to stop killing each other,” said Pickett’s mother about the song, entitled “Shannon”. “They’re not going to listen to the police; they need somebody like a parent to talk to them.”
Pickett’s mother said she is planning to petition to city to have a street near the school named “Shannon Street” so students will remember what happened.
In Evanston, honorary street names are displayed for 10 years on request of an alderman, according to city documents. Recommendations come from the Citizen’s Advisory Committee on Public Places, while the city council has the final authority.
Fellow ETHS parent Susan Gescheidle started the Evanston Live in Peace Alliance in Memory of Darryl Shannon Pickett.
The Alliance is planning to sponsor an annual 5K walk against gun violence, said Gescheidle, who has three children at ETHS, including one senior.
“I have a son who was the same age and it was such a happy time for us, and here’s a mother who her whole life was devastated with a shot of a gun,” she said. “My son and I wanted to do something.”
The efforts will help to remind the community of about problems of violence, said ETHS Superintendent Eric Witherspoon.
“We grieve the loss of a fine young man,” Witherspoon said. “And I think it’s symbolic; we don’t ever want to forget Shannon, but we also never want to forget that we cannot allow our children to be in danger.”
The efforts will also provide meaning to Pickett’s life, said his mother, who also lost her husband and sister last year.
“I’m totally destroyed,” she said. “But the message is that Shannon didn’t just lose his life. He made a sacrifice so we all could have a better life.”
