One year ago, at a charity dinner in Richmond, Va. to support former Seahawk Michael Robinson’s annual Celebrity Waiter Dinner and Football Camp, Seahawks cornerback Richard Sherman met a high school junior with middling grades and he challenged her to work her way onto her school’s honor roll in her senior year.
The dinner was a benefit for the Excel to Excellence Foundation, which was founded by Robinson in 2010 to motivation students to perform well academically and provide resources and support for underprivileged children.
Hershai James, then a junior at Varina (Va.) High School, met Sherman at the dinner and stared talking to him.