Rotary Club of Carol Stream chooses the recipients for the 2020 College scholarship award
The Rotary Club of Carol Stream has chosen this year's recipients for the annual College Scholarship. Each year, the committee reviews and selects recipient(s) who exemplify the goals and attributes that best represent the Rotary Ideals. For four years, these students work hard to maintain a high grade point average to be able to apply to the University or College of their choice. They join school clubs that interest them, and participate in community service work that helps them grow into upstanding individuals in our society. Each year, high school seniors submit applications that include their best representation of themselves. This includes their transcripts, school clubs and community service work, work experience, and a teacher recommendation letter and survey. In addition, they submit an essay explaining their understanding of their college goals, life ambitions, family background and history, and any general pertinent financial information that will help them achieve the scholarship award. The students have to be in the Carol Stream area served by our club, have a C or better grade point average, have financial need, as well as the completed application.
This year, with COVID restrictions in place, the Rotary Club could not interview the students face to face. We developed a rubric to help the committee be fair to all of the potential student applicants. The Rubric and all of the applications were sent by email. The votes were tallied from the rubric from all of the committee members, and we chose two applicants to split our 2020 scholarship award.
Our first scholarhip winner was Melanie J. She is a student at Wheaton North HS, and comes from a single parent home. She was commended by one of her teachers as being a determined individual. She has worked for church groups, Home Depot, and Wheaton Outreach. At school, she participated in Children's play, a Step Team, and the Black Student Alliance. She helped organize the Black History Month. She hopes to continue to speak out against racism while pursuing journalism in college.
Our second scholarship winner was Abigail S. She attends West Chicago HS. Even though her father died of cancer, she managed to attain honor roll status. She was involved in varsity dance, student council/ambassador program, and pep club. Outside of school, she worked with the Bartlett park district. She volunteered with Feed my Starving Children and Winfield Good Ole Days. One of her teachers noted that Abigail has developed a deep intellectual outlook and a good work ethic. Abigail has learned to overcome adversity and plans on majoring in psychology at College.
Congratulations to both our outstanding young women and best of luck to both of them for an exciting future.
