In high school, she immersed herself in books and art before joining the track team – and then broke two records.
She also became the only girl to place at a mathematics league’s state championship.
For an introvert, Norah Koerber often ends up in unexpected circumstances.
And on a balmy early June evening, she again finds herself in a situation that feels unnatural: preparing to deliver the valedictorian speech to her 24-person graduating class and more than 100 family members and friends.
“I don’t have anything to say,” Norah groans.
She just got back from a school picnic celebrating the end of the academic year, tired from a few competitive games of kickball and not going to bed until 2 a.m.
Norah sits on the porch of her family’s house – one of her favorite places – but it brings no comfort.
The pressure of needing to submit an address the night before quickly transforms into a sickening feeling she remembers experiencing almost her whole life.
“What I could share would be my more personal insight, the stuff I’ve learned, but it seems to go against a lot of what people on Reddit say,” Norah explains, acknowledging the anonymous forum may not be the best source on speechwriting.
“I don’t know though. I’m struggling to draw the line between what is important to me and what is applicable to a large audience. There’s a lot of people in very different situations.”
And although the unexpected seems to follow her everywhere, so does Norah’s faith and determination to succeed.
Norah Koerber enjoys a moment of reflection from an overlook at Schenley Park in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.
Where She Comes From
Norah grew up in a family of six in Greenfield, a hilly neighborhood about four miles southeast of downtown Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.
Third in the birth order but the first girl, she melds oldest-daughter drive with a middle child’s ability to blend in.
Her parents never worry about how she’ll do in school.
Norah’s brothers seek her advice.
She contemplates every decision.
While at a local restaurant, Norah chooses a build-your-own burger and treats the order form like the SAT – considering all of the possible combinations before picking the right pairing to go with the patty: lettuce, tomato, and an over easy egg on a pretzel bun.
Christine Koerber noticed her daughter’s deliberate nature at an early age but says she can crack a joke when the moment warrants it.
“There’s this video of Norah at 2 or 3 years old,” Christine recalls. “Her brother is rehearsing a poem and can’t remember the line, but Norah is behind him whispering it. She gave him just enough time to try and think of the word – popcorn balls – on his own before finally shouting it herself.”
Norah’s interests also reflect her introspectiveness.
She thrifts books on the Silk Road and the history of plastic surgery, watches thunderstorms with her Australian shepherd, Eustace, and recreates famous landscapes.
Norah plans to study pharmacy at Purdue University in the fall.
To those who don’t know her as well, she projects a quiet, steady confidence.
But it doesn’t come easily.
What She Carries
Norah traces her anxiety back to first grade.
The same mind that turns actions and words over carefully also ruminates on them too long. For someone who prefers to process things privately, attention on what she does brings stress.
Nerves develop days before a race or when she approaches people, even a close friend. School assignments trigger them as well.
The worst instance happened while writing her senior capstone paper on Vincent Van Gogh.
Norah agonized whether her words reflected what the artist spent a lifetime trying to say through his paintings — and over the pressure of needing to do well on the assignment to graduate.
She did, obviously. But the anguish lingered.
“I felt the residual effects of the stress for about a month and a half in the form of occasional inability to eat, uncontrollable trembling, and a sick feeling in my stomach from fifth to eighth period,” she says.
Norah’s father, Matt Koerber, describes the same intense inner life.
Neither he nor Christine knew their daughter dealt with anxiety until she recently told them — a hard yet important thing to do at 18.
“I’m encouraged that she is able to take steps to solve problems in a way that I couldn’t at that age,” Matt says.
Naming those feelings taught Norah something else too.
Unexpected circumstances don’t just happen to her.
They become the conditions in which she grows best.
How She Runs
In four years, Norah went from wishing away the spectators at track meets to darting across the field to cheer teammates toward the finish line.
“Sometimes I’m just like, ‘Is this the same girl?’” James Hommes, her coach, states with affectionate disbelief.
Depending on who you ask, Norah’s brother had encouraged — or forced her — to join the team.
Cross country came after, also reluctantly. She dreaded the much longer distance.
And yet, Norah’s times improved – dramatically.
She set two Trinity Christian School records for the 4x400-meter and 4x800-meter relays and helped the team qualify for the Western Pennsylvania Interscholastic Athletic League championships each season of her career.
This spring, Norah’s relay squad fell just short of states. And it still stings.
“It’s hard not to feel a little bit bummed,” Norah admits. “I will get to a point where I can look back on the season and feel more content and prouder of what I got done but it does feel like I was so close to achieving what I wanted but so far away.”
She pauses.
“I’ve been feeling a lit bit convicted about my tendency to covet. I ended up going to watch a friend compete, and it was really hard to see times that I felt we could have run.”
But that last meet gave Norah something too.
Teammates sought her afterward to say thank you.
“They said, ‘I know it ended pretty hard for you, but you were such an encouragement over the season. You really pushed me to become better.’”
That’s the version of Norah her parents watch from the sidelines.
The one who paces along the track, so she can be the first to congratulate someone after their race.
The one who offers grounded support to underclassmen, so they can understand how their capable bodies will feel while sprinting.
The one who continues tradition by nudging her younger sister to join, so the Koerbers can enjoy a few more years of meets.
“Something else comes out of her when running,” Christine says.
Though classmates and competitors got a big head start on Norah Koerber, she raced past them on the way to a record-breaking track career.
James sees it as well and attributes Norah’s success to her willingness to be changed by what she encounters.
What She Wants to Know
When Norah began writing her senior capstone paper, she planned to explore Van Gogh’s mental health issues.
But as James pushed Norah to consider more about the artist, she did. He also teaches history and humanities at Trinity and served as the advisor for her project.
“When you suggest Norah read or listen to something, she always does,” James explains.
Shalaine Breedan teaches Norah’s favorite subject, chemistry, and recognizes the same quality in how she moves through a problem.
“I can’t tell you how many times she has asked a question that I’ve been like, ‘Oh, I need to think about how I’m going to answer this,’” Shalaine notes.
“Her brain will connect a lesson to something learned months earlier, which doesn’t usually happen. Students tend to stick to questions within that unit.”
Throughout high school, Norah learned on her own terms.
She taught herself algebra II and skipped calculus, instead reading through the textbook and passing the AP exam. Norah then enrolled in a self-directed, college- level statistics course through Portage Learning.
Needless to say, the freedom to take whatever class she wants at Purdue feels like a long time coming.
It didn’t surprise anyone when Norah chose a career that combines the subjects she excels in and challenges her in a way she craves.
Norah would like to pursue nuclear pharmacy, a specialty area of the practice that involves compounding radioactive materials for use in medical tests and procedures.
For example, the drugs created can show how someone’s kidneys function or stop harmful tumors from growing.
Because radioactive materials decay quickly, nuclear pharmacists must work overnight to prepare them, meaning the midnight to 9 a.m. shift suits the night owl.
So does the thought of formulating drugs for cancer patients.
But she also knows by now that life can redirect her – and to always follow that path.
How She Believes
In 2016, Matt, the senior pastor at City Reformed Presbyterian Church, went on a yearlong sabbatical during which the Koerbers spent two months in Greece.
Christine’s sister and her husband connected them to a church in Athens supporting Syrians fleeing the country’s civil war.
Norah, then 8 years old, recalls playing with the children as their parents received assistance.
She came home and read every missionary story available to her.
“I think at one point Norah would’ve said she wanted to be a missionary,” Christine recollects.
That desire to serve never went away.
It just found new forms.
And Norah’s faith ties everything she does together.
It’s the one aspect of her life she doesn’t keep private.
Norah runs sound for her church’s evening services.
She observes the Sabbath with intention – staying off her phone and completing any homework beforehand.
At track meets, Norah prays before her races, welcoming anyone, including competitors, to join.
“My relationship with God has been really good for me,” she states. “It’s especially helped with my anxiety and given me a sense of security that I don’t think I’d have otherwise.”
Norah’s faith allows her to interpret the unexpected.
That doesn’t mean those answers come easily though — and each time she works on the valedictorian speech, the same thought surfaces: Norah wouldn’t be in this situation without God giving her something to say.
Once More
Two nights before graduation, Norah sits down and writes the personal version.
The speech that leans into the lessons she’s learned rather than the one social media told her to draft.
Norah doesn’t know if it will connect, but this version, like most things in her life, started from somewhere she didn’t plan to go.
In a few weeks, Norah will move on from a class of two dozen students to a university with more than 43,000 undergraduates.
Norah Koerber’s faith and determination to succeed have led her to unexpected places, and prepared her well for the next step on her educational journey — Purdue University.
She won’t learn her housing assignment until late summer and doesn’t know which classes or which friends will show up on the other side of it.
“When it was further off, I was more like, ‘Oh, I’ll get to wander around and do whatever I want,’” she says. “But now that it’s closer, it’s becoming a bit more daunting.”
Norah takes a moment in the way she always does before saying something meaningful.
“I think ultimately it will end up being really good once I get through those first couple of days.”
A mother’s intuition hints at how it will go.
“I’m looking forward to her having success apart from us,” Christine says. “She will thrive, and I can’t wait to watch that happen.”
One more unexpected circumstance.
The same girl walking into it.
