T-L Photos/JOSIE BURKHART Why Don’t You Stay Awhile board members gather at their evening buzz event to focus on youth retention and invite St. Clairsville Mayor Kathryn Thalman and Union Local head football coach Bernie Thompson to help their mission of community growth.

ST. CLAIRSVILLE — St. Clairsville Mayor Kathryn Thalman and Union Local head football coach Bernie Thompson spoke to youth about staying awhile in the Ohio Valley and how to work hard in this area.

Founder and chair Spencer Porter started the Why Don’t You Stay Awhile nonprofit’s buzz event Wednesday evening at Kirke’s Homemade Ice Cream by telling visitors what the nonprofit is all about — youth retention, with three pillars to support the work it does: professional and personal development, civic engagement and fun.

“This group that we’re forming, this isn’t my group, this isn’t the board’s group, this is our group,” Porter said. “We get to decide what this area looks like, what our group looks like. We get a say, and for a long time in this valley. I don’t care if I sound crazy saying it, I will stand on it, for a long time we’ve been neglected. Young people have been neglected.”

After Porter and the board members introduced themselves, Union Local head football coach and OVAC 2025 Ohio team football coach Bernie Thompson talked to the group of young people at the buzz event.

He touched on his time as a head football coach in his 20s, with the Jets not winning a game his first year. Eventually, the team grew and would win more and more games as the years went by.

“My core values took over,” Thompson said. “I realized that hard work, it’s going to take a ton of hard work. If you want to be successful in anything, you’re going to have to work hard.”

He added that his second core value is embracing discomfort because if someone works hard, tough times will come. But people have to battle through those tough times and find out who they truly are during those times.

Thompson went on to say his main mission isn’t to coach football but to develop young leaders for the community.

“A staple of our program is to get kids out there, develop leaders, make them better in their families, make them better in the school, make them better in their communities,” he said. “And then the winning, that’s a byproduct, the football, that’s a byproduct.”

Thompson said he and assistant coach Anthony Rocchio teach life lessons, hold players accountable and try to be the proper example for the young men in the football program.

Thalman, who was the civic engagement spokesperson of the evening, began juggling tangerines she had brought to symbolize how everyone is juggling something in their daily lives. Attendees said they were juggling work or relationships.

“The point is we all have a lot in our lives we’re juggling right now,” she said. “And I think it is absolutely freaking awesome that you got this many people here that said, ‘You know what? We want to blow it up in this valley, we want people to realize there’s a lot to do here.”

Thalman asked attendees, “What is it we have here that is good?”

People named the cost of living, Oglebay in Wheeling, the Capitol Theatre in Wheeling, local colleges, the Wheeling Symphony, less traffic than urban areas and being an hour away from being able to see college or professional football in person.

Thalman approached her presentation as an interactive one, using long spoons and string as real-world examples. She asked volunteers to come up and try to tie a knot in a string without letting go of either end, which represented thinking outside the box and that anything is possible.

The next game with volunteers was to hold the end of a long wooden spoon and try to get candy out of the jar on the floor to feed themselves. Thalman went on to show people to take the spoon, get the candy and feed another person. This symbolized helping one another, rather than oneself.

Thalman told everyone, “The point is we help each other.”

Thalman encouraged people to not be strangers and to go into the municipal building to talk to her and bring ideas and tell her what they want to see.

Porter ended the discussions by asking attendees to think about what values are forming among everyone in the group and values that people think they should embody as young people.

Some words Spencer wrote on the board were helpful, mindful, grit and courageous.

“This is only going to grow, so let’s not just do this aimlessly.” Porter said. “Let’s have a plan, let’s be organized.

‘What are things, what are values we feel like when we come together we already embody? But what are some other values we want to develop as a community?’ So I want us to be thinking about all of these things.”

Visitors stayed afterward to network, socialize and listen to a DJ after gaining insight from community leaders.

WDYSA’s next buzz event will be at 6:30 p.m. March 19 at Wheeling University’s NASA Challenger Center with a virtual reality trip to the international space station.