One of 38 community college students among millions across the nation, Amanda Wood of Rochester has received an Undergraduate Transfer Scholarship worth up to $30,000 a year to continue her education at a four-year institution.
Amanda, who will graduate from MCC in a few weeks, was one of 676 nominees from 17 states and eight foreign nations to receive a scholarship from the Jack Kent Cooke Foundation, which offers one of the largest and most competitive scholarship programs to undergraduates in America.
Amanda is the second MCC student to receive a Kent Cooke scholarship. Eboni White was awarded a scholarship in 2002, the first year they were given. Eboni attended the University of Rochester and now works in MCC’s Upward Bound program.
Selection criteria included academic excellence, financial need, will to succeed, leadership ability, service to others, and interest in or appreciation for the arts. The scholarship program offers support for tuition, room and board, books and other required fees for the remainder of the scholars’ bachelor’s degree, generally two or three years.
Amanda plans to pursue a Master's degree and eventually a Doctorate within the biology and geology disciplines.
Amanda was just 12 when her mother was diagnosed with Takayasu’s arteritis, an uncommon form of vasculitis that causes inflammation to the arteries or blood vessels that carry blood away from the heart. Amanda stepped in to help her mother.
“She is great at time management, thanks to years of balancing care for her mother with her classes,” says Paul Emerick, assistant professor of biology. “She applies critical thinking not just to the sciences but to arts and literature.”
Wood serves as president of MCC’s Alpha Theta Iota award-winning chapter of Phi Theta Kappa. She has been listed to the Who’s Who Among Students in American Junior Colleges, serves on the Holocaust Genocide Studies Project, writes for the Monroe Doctrine, and carries a 3.79 grade point average, among other achievements. Please join me in congratulating Amanda on her outstanding accomplishment.
Information about the 2007 Jack Kent Cooke scholarship application can be obtained from Jodi Oriel, Jack Kent Cooke Scholarship faculty representative, in the Brighton Campus Center Office, 3-126.
Photo (l to r): Assistant Professor Paul Emerick; President R. Thomas Flynn; Amanda Wood; Dr. Susan Salvador, vice president, Student Services; and Jodi Oriel, assistant director, Campus Center.
Jodi Oriel
Campus Center
05/05/2006 |