Senior Duo Captures Michael Samuel Gilmor Scholarships

Ella O’Heir and Olivia Polinsky completed exceptional four year runs through Huntington High School by being named Michael Samuel Gilmor Memorial Scholarship recipients. The Class of 2024 duo have reached heights that can only be realized through sustained hard work and long-term commitment.

Few people can hope to impact the world in the way Michael Samuel Gilmor did in the much too short time he walked this good earth. A John H. Glenn High School graduate, he was well known to students at Huntington High School through his dad, who is dean of student support.

When Mr. Gilmor passed away suddenly at home of an aortic aneurism at only 22 years of age in August 2018, it was an awful time for everyone that knew and loved him.

Mr. Gilmor’s father, Robert is the founder of Huntington’s Habitat for Humanity club chapter. The father brought his son along on several trips the club made to rebuild housing in storm damaged communities across the country. During those trips, Michael Gilmor and the Huntington Habitat members were able to bond and grow to respect and admire one another.

A three-sport athlete (football, basketball and baseball) and Homecoming Day king at John H. Glenn, Mr. Gilmor graduated fifth in his class and went on to achieve great things at Providence College, where he changed his academic major from chemistry to biochemistry in his junior year after taking a Chemistry of Living Organisms class. He made the change of majors even though it required meeting additional courses. A teaching assistant in the laboratory of Professor Kenneth R. Overly, he graduated summa cum laude with a bachelor’s degree in biochemistry along with a business studies certificate.

Mr. Gilmor was Providence College’s Highest GPA in Concentration Award recipient for the biochemistry department, chemistry department and business department. He played intramural water polo, volleyball and basketball and volunteered with Habitat for Humanity in his free time.

Choosing to learn from everyone he came across, Mr. Gilmor used that knowledge to impart upon others love, humor, respect, happiness and an overwhelming feeling of acceptance. His true gift was that he made people that he met along the way feel special and the most important person in his life at that moment in time. A quote used by him on many occasions that was given to him by his mom, Janet, sums up how he went about his days: “Life is far too short to sweat the small things and to ignore the amazing opportunities you have been presented with.”

The Michael Samuel Gilmor Memorial Scholarship is regarded as one of Huntington’s most prized awards. Robert Gilmor struggled to get through his remarks at this year’s scholarship presentation while keeping his emotions under control, but it just wasn’t entirely possible as he went about describing in few short minutes his son’s remarkable life and how he touched the world and also listing the many qualities and future potential of each of the two 2024 award recipients.

Ms. O’Heir and Ms. Polinsky are the fifth set of Gilmor scholarship recipients since the award was first presented in 2020. The two Huntington seniors each received $750 scholarship stipends.

An Advanced Placement Scholar with Honor, Ms. O’Heir will be attending Fairfield University. She played on the Blue Devil varsity field hockey and golf teams.

Ms. Polinsky is also an Advanced Placement Scholar with Honor. She plans to study philosophy at the University of Georgia. She played on the varsity field hockey, track and field and Unified basketball teams, served as a four year ambassador and mentor with the Huntington Breast Cancer Action Coalition and played integral roles in the Natural Helpers program and Habitat for Humanity club. She also served as a two-year president of the high school’s Environmental Club.

At the time of his unexpected and shocking passing, Mr. Gilmor had just completed a year of teaching English in Poland through the Fulbright English teaching assistantship program. He was Providence’s first science major to receive a Fulbright award and was one of just 15 students nationally to be chosen to teach in Poland.

Mr. Gilmor said he chose Poland because it welcomes teaching assistants with science backgrounds and because his great-grandparents were born there. He learned Poland had the first Habitat for Humanity chapter in Europe. Fulbright is the flagship international exchange program of the U.S. government.

As a Fulbright English teaching assistant in Poland, Mr. Gilmor taught English as a second language at Łomża State University of Applied Sciences and shared his knowledge of American culture by organizing activities and lessons in public schools across Poland. He especially enjoyed working with Polish youth in remote areas of the country, volunteering his time outside of the university teaching schedule to ensure as many students as possible had an opportunity to learn from an American grantee. He encouraged inclusivity during his hands-on lessons and encouraged his students to follow their dreams. He lived by the principles of teaching through experience and stories, through laughter and fun and through service.

On April 25, 2019, the Polish-U.S. Fulbright Commission in cooperation with the U.S. Embassy and Łomża State University of Applied Sciences organized a tree-planting ceremony in memory of Mr. Gilmor. The ceremony took place in Łomża, on the university’s campus. The event was attended by US, Polish and Fulbright officials along with professors and students who mentored or worked with Mr. Gilmor. In their remarks, speakers honored his memory and his involvement in educating Polish youth.

The oak tree planted in Łomża (with an engraved placard that bears Mr. Gilmor’s name) is a living symbol of hope and healing that will ensure that his life’s work lives on.