Connor
McGorry
"
Student of the Month"
By: Frankie Montiforte
 In
a world where kids are growing up faster than ever, and not always for the
better, it does a heart good to occasionally come across a child who is as
terrific as Connor McGorry. Connor
is an 8 year-old boy from Long Island, New York, who is like one of those
children from a Norman Rockwell painting of long ago.
The only difference is that the kids portrayed in those paintings
were not black belts or kickboxing enthusiasts.
Right before his eighth birthday Connor received his black belt,
which is impressive when you take into account that it takes most kids
until 9 years-old to accomplish that feat.
A very shy little boy with low self-esteem, Connor overcame those
stigmas to turn himself around and win tournaments as well as to receive an
almost perfect straight A report card.
Now in the third grade, Connor has missed only one day of school
since kindergarten and has two perfect attendance records.
W anting
to train and be able to protect himself from the neighborhood bullies,
Connor discovered karate after watching Bruce Lee in Enter the Dragon.
Now his idol, Bruce Lee inspired Connor in part because, like
himself, Bruce was not a big  man
but packed a wallop just the same. Connor
has also learned that through Martial Arts training he can achieve
anything he set his mind to (height and weight class aside).
Take for example his favorite basketball player, the
Philadelphia’s
76ers Allen Iverson. Iverson
is the fastest player now playing in the NBA despite that fact that he is
too small to slam-dunk. “I
can train myself to do anything I put my mind too,” Connor announced
proudly. “I can’t do back
flips now but I will someday.” Under
the strong leadership of his teacher and World Kickboxing Champion Tommy
"Bee" Bottone, Connor is a student at AFC Kickboxing as well as
a junior blackbelt at the East Coast Blackbelt Academy both in Middle
Island, NY. Aside
form the kickboxing tournaments he takes part in on a regular basis,
Connor also plays basketball (a sport he fell in love with when he broke his
arm and couldn’t participate in swim class awhile back) and tennis.
 The
only child born to Susanne and Brian McGorry, Connor is described by his
mother as a normal child who likes to watch Scooby Doo, read books, and
ride bikes with his friends from school.
When he is not studying or practicing his one hour of karate a day
(he loves to train), Connor can be found doing all sorts of charitable
work, including donating clothes to the Big Brothers and Big Sisters Organization and dipping into his piggy bank for church
donations. Along with his
classmates, he also donated money at a recent school rally to help the
families of the victims from the September 11th terrorist
attacks.
His
mother Susanne definitely sees the difference Martial Arts have made on
her son’s life. “He has
more self-confidence than ever before and it spills over into every aspect
of his life.” She went on
to say, “Last week an 11 year-old boy tried to pick a fight with him and
Connor rationally explained to the boy, that while he wasn’t afraid of
him, his Martial Arts training had taught him about soft power (talking
things out) as opposed to hard power (hitting), and the other boy finally
got the point and backed down.”
 Because Conner is the only black belt
in his karate class he takes great pride in his accomplishment. While
continuing to study hard and take classes, Connor is eagerly awaiting
conquering his next goal, achieving senior black belt status. Chalk it up to a combination youthful exuberance and Zen-like
confidence, but knowing Connor, I’ll lay odds right here and now that he
reaches that goal a lot sooner then anyone’s expecting.
If
you would like to contact Connor McGorry you can reach him
at
connormcgorry@worldblackbelt.com.
By:
Frankie Montiforte
frankie@worldblackbelt.com
To view previous honoree
click here.
*If you wish to
nominate a candidate for Student of the Month you can email us at
nominees@worldblackbelt.com.
*Only WorldBlackBelt members can
nominate and/or be nominated.
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