De Soto High School freshman Elizabeth Mayberry sensed there was something wrong as she walked down a De Soto street in March 2016. Her fears were confirmed when she looked down the street and saw an elderly man standing on the side of the road crying for help, engulfed in flames. The man had been burning rosebushes when he had spilled gasoline on himself and caught on fire. Mayberry threw her backpack off and ran towards the man, pulling off her jacket and wrapping it around him in an attempt to put out the fire.

When she realized her efforts were not working, Mayberry rushed into the man’s house, filling a pitcher full of water and continuing to run back and forth until the fire was out. She then called 911, and ambulances and police officers were sent to assist her and the man.

Nearly three months later, on May 18, a teary-eyed Mayberry stood in front of her classmates as Johnson County Sheriff Frank Denning retold the story at a school-wide assembly. Mayberry received the Citizens Award of Valor, the highest award given to citizens by the Johnson County Sheriff’s Department.

The Valor Award is only given to those who perform the most selfless acts to save another’s life, and who risk their own safety to help others in need.

“[The Valor Award is] very distinguishable and it would be a very big honor. I think that to [the recipient’s] colleagues or their fellow students it represents character and it represents going beyond and above and risking their own safety to help others,” Denning said. “It did end with the man dying because of the burns, but that didn’t stop her. She continued to try to extinguish, she got ahold of the man’s wife, she called 911, she did everything in her power to see if she could save his life.”

Mayberry said that receiving the award in front of the entire DHS student body was “nerve-wracking,” but very meaningful to her.

The reaction to the man was “automatic” for Mayberry, as she “couldn’t just leave him there. I couldn’t just watch him burn to death so I ran up to him and put my jacket on him and tried my best to put it out.”

Mayberry made DHS history as the first student to ever receive such a prestigious award, according to Student Resource Officer Mark Leiker.

“We recognize kids for academics, we recognize them for athletic achievement, but this is the first time we have ever done something like this. So, it was pretty cool,” Leiker said. “It’s pretty selfless because one of the deals they consider [when choosing the award recipient] is the fact that you give no regards for your personal safety to help somebody else. That’s kind of what she did … It’s pretty impressive, pretty prestigious.”