Our club was happy to make the presentations to the 2015 Rotary Scholarship winners at our weekly morning meeting.
Today was the culmination of the last few months of work by our Scholarship committee. We were able to present 14 High School seniors with scholarships towards their education. The recipients were from both Wyckoff and Midland Park.
They gathered with their grandparents, parents, principals and teachers to mark this great occasion.
For the last few months our tireless Scholarship committed have been doing in-depth interviews of the 27 candidates that applied for scholarships. About 42 hours of time were spent by our committee members in total doing interviews, which is a reflection of how important this initiative is to our club every year. All the candidates were exceptional and deserving students, however, we had to pick the 14 that we felt most strongly understood and espoused the ideals of Rotary.
As a club we are heavily committed to developing the youth in our towns to inspire and work with them to become leaders in the community with a commitment to service. This is evidenced in our strong Interact clubs in the local high schools. We look forward to hearing from this years recipients over the coming years and seeing them evolve as leaders in whatever community they belong to. They know they are welcome to join us on any Thursday at 7:30am in The Brick House for our weekly meeting as our guest - this invitation was extended to the students and their parents during the presentation.
We wish the students well and encourage them to join the Rotaract clubs in their respective colleges to continue learning more about the spirit of Rotary and to get engaged in community service.
Photographed below are the students with their principals and our Scholarship Committee:
Our club sent 12 students to RYLA this year. RYLA provides training for our youth to become future leaders. As a club we are heavily committed to this initiative and investment in our youth.
Dear All Members and Friends of our Rotary Club,
We should all be very proud for the hard our Club put into supporting RYLA this year. The closing ceremony last Friday confirmed all of this!
This year RYLA graduated 105 RYLA-teers; Students now armed with real confidence and real understanding on how to go out and make a difference in the world! With what we did in supporting our 12 students in Wyckoff and Midland Park getting into RYLA this year is we made a huge difference that will give back, in my opinion, many times over.
In closing I must relay how much the RYLA Committee, and the RYLA counselors are thankful for each and every student that District 7490 Rotary Clubs brought to RYLA this year. RYLA truly applauds you!
Below, six of the students that we sent to RYLA that provided us with thoughtful insight into what the week meant to them at our special Scholarship Breakfast:
