From left to right, Prince Frederick Rotary Club Scholarship Committee Chairman Justin Ruest, scholarship recipients Anna Almuete, Carli Stewart, Caitlin Keegan and LeAnn Fung, and Club President Rich Fleming.
Prince Frederick, MD – With a huge volume of young applicants seeking financial support to further their schooling, a Southern Maryland service organization that focuses efforts on education announced their decisions for 2016. The Rotary Club of Prince Frederick revealed the names of their four scholarship recipients Monday evening, May 9. The four are due to graduate with honors next month from Calvert County’s public school system. Each recipient earned $2,000 grants from the club.
“We had over 100 applicants,” said local Rotarian Justin Ruest, who chaired the local club’s scholarship committee. Ruest told the gathering of club members and guests during the May 9 dinner meeting at Stoney’s in Prince Frederick that interviewing the many applicants “was the highlight of my year. It’s encouraging to see the students the county is putting out there.”
Ruest told The BayNet that the four-person scholarship committee—which included a former school superintendent and an active community college dean—managed to narrow the large number of applications to 12 and then finally down to four.
“We could have given away 25 scholarships,” said retired school superintendent and longtime Rotarian Gene Karol, who lamented that the club did not have the funds to award more grants to worthy students.
The four students selected this year were Calvert High School (CHS) senior Anna Almuette, who has been accepted to the University of Maryland Baltimore Campus, where she will major in biological science; Northern High School senior Kaitlin Keegan, who plans to attend Massachusetts Institute of Technology, where she will major in mechanical engineering; CHS senior Carli Stewart, who plans to attend the University of Tennessee, majoring in biomedical engineering; and Huntingtown High School senior LeAnn Fung, recipient of the local club’s Eddie Allen Vocational Scholarship, who will attend Liberty University and major in computer science.
“Every penny counts,” said Almuette when accepting her scholarship. “This will be a big help to my parents.”
“This is a really substantial amount,” said Keegan, who told the committee her goal was to start her own business someday.
Stewart thanked the Rotary members and stated her long-range goal was to do research to find a cure for cancer.
“I’ll be using the money towards a dorm [room] and to intern with the FBI,” said Fung.
The Prince Frederick Rotary Club raises a majority of the money it awards through scholarships through sales from their food trailer, which features seafood and is stationed at many local events throughout the year.
Contact Marty Madden at marty.madden@thebaynet.com
