Andrew Wolfson

@adwolfson

You are already a successful trial lawyer. Then you collect a $6.4 million settlement for yourself when a defective shotgun blows off part of your hand. So what do you do with the money — and the rest of your life?

If you're Nick King, you dedicate your windfall — and yourself — to helping children get a fair chance.

First, you promise to pay for 38 mostly poor sixth-graders to go to college — if they meet with you twice a week for six years and finish high school. Thirty-four of them graduate, and 21 go on to earn bachelor's degrees.

Then you start another program, this one for girls. You personally shepherd them, most of them also poor, through elite Sacred Heart Academy. You pay their $12,000-a-year tuition. You meet with them each week to share their successes and tribulations. You make them master 4,000 vocabulary words. You take them to the opera, the jailhouse, the courthouse and fine restaurants. You teach them, test them, mentor them and counsel them.

And you exult in the success of children like Yvonne Gonzalez, who was born near Guadalajara, Mexico, and came with her parents when she was 3 years old to Shelby County, where her father works in an auto-parts plant.

She said she cried her first day at Sacred Heart when she saw girls carrying $300 purses and dropped off in Volvos and Mercedes. But with King urging her on, she threw herself into school life. She joined the United Nations club, the volleyball club, the bowling club — even though she had to use bumpers when she started.

She began school in the ninth grade slightly behind, but by the time she graduated last May, said King, "She was 'Miss Everything.' "

Gonzalez, now 18 and a freshman at Eastern Kentucky University, is one of 53 girls who have graduated from the elite college-preparatory school thanks to the King Scholar Program.

Founded 15 years ago by King and his wife, the late Carol Zurkulen King, a 1962 Sacred Heart graduate, the program has been a fantastic success, said current and former school officials — and the girls themselves.

"I wish there were millions of Mr. Kings," Gonzalez said, "and that I could duplicate him."

Twenty-six scholars have gone on to graduate from colleges and universities, and another 17 are attending full time. Five have earned master's degrees and one an M.D. Three are enrolled at Sacred Heart, and more are in the pipeline.

None have been arrested, none got pregnant in high school, and only three had to be asked to leave, King said.

They have triumphed despite language barriers and family poverty as well as the huge financial and cultural gaps between them and at least some of their fellow students.

Gonzalez said at first she didn't know what to think of King, a former commonwealth's attorney and state Supreme Court justice. "I thought, 'Why is he doing this. He has a lot of money. Why is he going to waste his money on a bunch of girls?' "

But as time went on, she said, "I realized he didn't get anything out of it, other than knowing he has helped us succeed in life and change our community."

King, 69, practices what is known as personal philanthropy, in which rich people — usually business titans — throw themselves along with their money at a problem.

It is probably best known for the "I Have a Dream Foundation" programs across the United States in which benefactors adopt an entire grade from an elementary school. None are currently operating in Louisville, though the late R. Gene Smith adopted a class of 58 fourth-graders at Engelhard Elementary School in the early 1990s, of which 34 had graduated from high school eight years later.

Experts say that for such programs to work, the benefactors must do more than open their wallets — they must build long-term relationships with the students marked by caring and trust.

King has done just that, said Paula Klein-Kracht, who was Sacred Heart's principal when the King Scholars program began. His effort goes "way, way beyond just writing checks," she said.

King said giving the money is the easiest part. He said some would-be philanthropists have come to observe his program, then backed off.

"Some are willing to put forth the money but not the effort, and that won't work," King said. "If it was just the money, our problems would have been solved a long time ago."

King started working with children in his 20s, as a baseball coach — "I figured if I could teach them how to hit a curve ball I could teach them other things," he said.

He started small with Sacred Heart, pledging to put 15 girls through the Catholic school on the Ursuline campus in Crescent Hill.

But he quickly raised the stakes, saying he'd pledge $500,000 for tuition and books, if Sacred Heart would raise $250,000 to match, which it did. King has kicked in more money for calculators, computers, tutors and field trips, and for college scholarships.

He said his goal — and the school's — was to give young women from low-income families the chance to succeed — and to markedly increase diversity at the school, whose few minority students tended to be children of doctors and other elites.

King set a higher benchmark than for his earlier "Project Vision," in which sixth-graders were admitted if they could merely envision themselves being successful at something. Prospective King Scholars would have to show they could put forth their "best effort in and out of school."

If so, they would be admitted, whether they were "super students or fragile students," and even if they had learning or physical disabilities.

"The deal is: If you do your best and remain highly motivated, I will pay for you to go to Sacred Heart Academy. And if you graduate, I will help you go to college."

First, though, they have to complete a five-week summer school personally taught by King, in which they are taught how to answer the phone, respond to emails, introduce one adult to another, give public speeches — and to master 200 vocabulary words.

"I didn't like having to memorize words — I thought, 'I'm never going to have to use these words in my life,' " recalled Gonzalez, who endured the summer session after finishing eighth grade in Shelby County. "But then I was watching the news with my father and I said, 'Dad, I know that word. I learned it from Mr. King.' "

She said the word, coincidentally, was "philanthropist."

Future scholars also must climb the dreaded pole — a 35-foot tower that is part of a ropes obstacle course at Mount Saint Francis — then jump off while they are belayed by three fellow students. King, who has climbed the tower himself, says it teaches them to overcome their fears and to work with and trust others.

"It gave me a real confidence boost," said Markeyeh Lewis, 18, who grew up in Hikes Point with a single mother, graduated last May from Sacred Heart and is now a freshman nursing student at U of L. "I thought, 'Did I just do that?' "

Once admitted as full-time students, King Scholars take the same courses as other students, but also must learn 1,000 vocabulary words a year, on which they are tested personally by King.

The vocabulary training culminates in a 4,000-word test they are given as seniors, which they must pass with a score of 98 or higher, if they want King to kick in a $1,000 scholarship. He said every scholar has passed.

"It was hard, but I wasn't going to let it slip away," said Crystal Kelly, who grew up at 24th and Madison streets and was named Kentucky's 2004 Miss Basketball. She graduated from Western Kentucky University before playing in the WNBA and overseas before taking a job as assistant women's basketball coach at Bellarmine University.

Beverly McAuliffe, Sacred Heart's principal for 11 years until 2012, said King was tough. "They had to work to their potential. He was 100 percent committed to them, but he wasn't their buddy. He insisted they become successful. Then they became his friend."

It hasn't always gone smoothly. One of the first scholars, an African American, dropped out, King said, tiring of going home to her neighborhood and having her friends deride her for "trying to be white."

Another student, a graduate who attended Centre College for two years, dropped out when she became pregnant and had a baby. But she is working and intends to return to school, said King, who stays in touch with her and all the scholars. "She is and will continue to be a fine mother," he said.

King calls himself a "pragmatic idealist" who demands results and doesn't just give money away.

"I tell them I am their 'doorman' — that I'm going to open doors for you," he said. "But if you don't walk through, don't expect me to stand there like a fool and keep the door open."

He acknowledges his program is no panacea for poverty.

"I believe you change the world one life at a time, and when you change one life, you change many lives," he said. "These young women have changed the perspective of thousands of other students, of their families and their communities.

"They set a new standard for their brothers, sisters, aunts and uncles and the neighborhoods — that if Markeyeh can earn a full scholarship, maybe I can," he said. "They are fantastic ambassadors for equality."

King, whose King Foundation for Social Justice also runs three smaller scholarship programs, said he believes in the "intrinsic goodness" of everyone.

"The challenge is to bring that out," he said. "And I believe one of society's most unforgivable sins is not offering children the tools they need to do that."

As for the scholars, they still call him "Mr. King," even the ones who are now approaching 30.

"He is a huge part of what I am today," said Lewis, the U of L sophomore who was a seventh-grader at Highland Middle School when she met him.

Added Gonzalez, the EKU student, "There are not enough 'thank yous' in the world I could give him."

Reporter Andrew Wolfson can be reached at (502) 582-7189

INFORMATION

•To learn more about the King Scholar Program and the King Foundation for Social Justice, see: http://www.nickking.org/

•To apply, visit http://www.nickking.org/kingscholarprogram/howtoapply.html