Fifth-grader recognized for King essay

LYNN – She stands barely four feet tall but Ford School fifth-grader Kaylee Kjersgard packed such a powerful message in her Martin Luther King Jr. essay that it landed her on a stage at Salem State University.”I was really nervous,” she said. “Even after I read my speech I was still nervous.”Kjersgard’s class was given an assignment to write their reflections on King. Kjersgard said she wrote hers out longhand, then neatly typed it and handed it in. Days later she was told that her essay was going to be entered in the college’s King Day contest that invited students of all ages to write about their thoughts on the civil rights leader.When asked what she wrote, Kjersgard froze momentarily.”Oh my God, I knew the whole speech yesterday and now I can’t remember a thing,” she said before regaining her focus.Kjersgard said she looked at how people today try to live like King, “striving for equality in the past, present and future,” and how he stopped segregation.”He had a dream and I have a dream,” she said. “My dream is ? we let Barack Obama be the first black president in the U.S., then I could change the world and be the first woman president.”She said when she learned her essay had won first place in the elementary school division, “I started freaking out.” She said her friends thought she was getting in trouble, but she couldn’t stop smiling when she told them she had won the contest. Then she ran home to tell her parents.”I was so happy,” she said.On Monday Kjersgard headed to Salem State’s Martin Luther King Jr. convocation, where she met Salem Mayor Kimberley Driscoll and university President Patricia Meservey.”I got to eat a big dinner at lunch, and I had to read my speech in front of a lot of people,” Kjersgard said.She called the event a little overwhelming, largely because she expected to see other students her age. She said she kept looking around for first-graders or third-graders and then realized that she was going to be the youngest and the smallest on the stage.She wasn’t exactly alone, however. Ford School Principal Claire Crane attended the event, along with a busload of Kjersgard’s classmates.”We took over two fifth-grade classes,” Crane said. “She did very well. We were so proud of her.”Kjersgard’s parents and 3-year-old brother also sat in the front row and watched her on stage.”My parents both started to cry,” she said. “My father cried. He didn’t even cry when my brother was born but he cried for this.”For her efforts Kjersgard also received a certificate signed by Driscoll and Meservey and $100.”I didn’t even care about the money,” she said. “I just like to write.”Kjersgard said she has already written a book about horses.”I was in the first grade, though,” she said. “I just reread it the other day. It’s not very good.”She is five chapters into her second novel about a pair of twin sisters, one who is very popular and the other who is sort of a nerd, she said.When she grows up, Kjersgard said she wants to be a writer and a horseback rider. For now, her essay hangs on her wall at home and her feet serve as a reminder of her success.”I already spent most of the money already,” she said modeling a pair of suede, fleece-lined boots. “I spent it on boots, books, notebooks, binders, pens and pencils ? I’m still nervous about it all. It was exciting.”