CRANBERRY TWP — Even when she was not permitted to play, Amy Kolor was a leader for her soccer team.

Her South Asia Youth Summit trip to Nepal and Sri Lanka resulted in receiving the Green Championship award from Pittsburgh Mayor Luke Ravenstahl.

A final project in one of her courses wound up taking second place in the Antelope Film Festival.

Such versatility and success has landed Kolor, a Cranberry Township resident and Sewickley Academy senior, a WPIAL Scholar Athlete award. She was one of 10 girls selected from 140 WPIAL schools.

“I was honored just being nominated to represent my school,” Kolor said. “Being selected is an amazing feeling.”

Kolor attended Seneca Valley for two years before transferring to Sewickley Academy for her junior and senior years. She carries a 4.0 grade point average and is headed to Yale to study engineering.

Sewickley Academy athletic director Win Palmer said he received approximately 10 nominations from coaches and teachers to represent the school’s nominees for the scholar-athlete honor.

“Each WPIAL school is permitted to nominate one boy and one girl for consideration,” Palmer said. “Amy did a phenomenal job for our soccer program and her academic honors are mind-boggling.

“Add in her community service and choosing her was not a hard decision.”

Kolor started on defense for Seneca Valley’s undefeated WPIAL championship team her freshman year. When she transferred to Sewickley Academy for her junior year, the WPIAL did not grant her soccer eligibility for that season.

“It was difficult, not playing,” Kolor said. “I had been playing soccer since I was 3. But, in a way, it was good. It taught me how to be a leader in a different way.

“I still practiced with the team every day. I encouraged from the sideline. I did what I could to make us better. I always considered myself to be a natural leader and had to learn how to be one off the field.”

Kolor went on to become a WPIAL finalist in the 200 meters as a member of the track team that spring. She did not run track this spring.

“I had to give up something. My plate was too full,” she said.

Last fall, Kolor started as central defender on a Sewickley Academy soccer team that was undefeated in the regular season, allowing just four goals. The team reached the WPIAL Class A title game before losing to Greensburg Central Catholic, 2-0.

Kolor was team captain and MVP — earning all-section and all-WPIAL honors — as Sewickley Academy posted 17 shutouts.

“Her ability to communicate to her teammates is extraordinary,” Palmer said. “Amy was the anchor of that team. She is an incredible young lady.”

Kolor joined students from Obama Academy, Mt. Lebanon and Winchester Thurston last summer for the trip to Nepal and Sri Lanka. They visited schools and did presentations on water conservation and efficient energy use.

The group also implemented an environmental stewardship water conservation project in Pittsburgh, prompting the award from Mayor Ravenstahl.

“It was for environmental awareness and making a difference in our environment,” Kolor said. “It was a nice surprise.

“Going to another country, not knowing anyone in the group ... It was a little intimidating at first. But once I got to know the kids I was working with, seeing how driven they were ... We made some good connections.

“That whole experience opened some doors for me,” Kolor added.

Her final project in class was putting together a five-minute animated film. She wrote a poem, had music composed for it and took 1,300 pictures along with creating the animation.

“It was a cool experience and my teacher recommended I enter the final product in a film festival,” Kolor said.

“I enjoyed the creativity of it. I might do another one this summer, just for fun.”

So it goes with Kolor, who was also a first-ballot selection into the Cum Laude Society. She’s received the Harvard Book Award and English Award as well.

And she’s still not done with soccer.

“I’ll play on some team there, intramural, club or whatever,” she said of Yale. “At some point, maybe I’ll try for the college team.

“I have to get myself acclimated first.”