When she starts her classes at UC Berkeley on Aug. 22, Ana Hurtado will be the first person in her family ever to attend a university.
She is about to graduate ninth in her class at Watsonville High School with a 4.034 grade point average and many credits from honors courses. She was a guard on the varsity basketball team, earned a homecoming queen title and participated in a long list of extracurricular activities.
All these achievements earned Hurtado, 18, a $10,000 scholarship from the MAIA Foundation and the Educational Partnership Center at UC Santa Cruz.
"That's what my parents wanted for me," said Hurtado, whose parents moved to Watsonville from Mexico 18 years ago. "I'm glad that I'm making their dreams come true"
Watsonville High will present 265 scholarships to about 175 of its seniors at 7 p.m. Tuesday at the Henry J. Mello Center for the Performing Arts. The funds come from more than 90 donors for a total of more than $730,000.
That figure is about double the usual amount, in part because the Naval ROTC awarded two scholarships of $180,000 each, said Lorraine Sandoval, a guidance counselor at the high school. Hurtado's scholarship is also part of a one-time grant of $100,000, which was divided between 30 students, Sandoval said.
The MAIA Foundation, whose initials stand for Migration and Adaptation in the Americas, has worked for 35 years to send young people from the Pajaro Valley, mainly from low-income and often Latino families, to prestigious universities, where they've historically been underrepresented.
"If you met [Hurtado], you would be extremely impressed with her presence and maturity, and also with the aspirations that she expressed for her future," said Ann Wyckoff Carlos, president of the foundation. "She stood out among all the candidates that we considered for the award"Labels: academy awards, financial aid, free college, free education, high school, scholarship, student loans, study abroad |
