Joel Junker, Duke of the Year, Has Big Plans After High School

Joel Junker is Duke of the Year at Gloucester High School and an aspiring US Navy nuclear engineer. Joel says it was a combination of his accomplishments at GHS, character, and progression as a teenager to adult that got him chosen as Duke of the Year. He feels it is an honor to be given this title and does his best to stay deserving of the title by exemplifying how to be a good student and person for others to look up to. Nuclear engineers find new uses for nuclear power or material and manage them. He hopes to accomplish his goal of becoming one by going to college for 2 years right out of highschool and serving 4 years at sea. He wants to work in the private sector and work for a company like Dominion Energy. 5 years from now he dreams of being out at sea with the Navy somewhere close to Hawaii. Joel is currently not competing in any Winter athletics at GHS, but plans to play soccer at GHS in the spring. He has a great relationship with his family, despite being outnumbered with 5 sisters and a 6-month old chocolate lab named River. He is very thankful for everything he has been given and currently has in life and that all goes back to his relationship with God. Joel is a Student-Leader in the Fellowship of Christian Athletes here at GHS, and has been in amazing student groups at

Waters Edge Church in Yorktown and Petsworth Baptist in Gloucester, all of which he is proud to say have helped him grow as a Christian and a person. Lindsay Newell, a physical education teacher at GHS commends Joel for being ¨amazing, dependable, and reliable¨ She says his ability to see the entire picture to a problem from a social, mental, physical, and strategic aspect will help him be extremely successful at anything he sets his mind to. She hopes to see him travel the world and experience the world’s greatest gifts.