Our very first Drive for Education Scholarship program in Bend has finally come to a close, at our finale event.
We ended up with over 250 applications turned in by graduating Central Oregon high school seniors. Each student had a 3.0 GPA or higher, and had done a minimum of 15 hours of community service in order to qualify for the scholarship. The night of the finale we had almost 500 people come to Kendall Toyota of Bend to see who the 10 scholarship winners would be and to see who would win the grand prize, a brand new Toyota Corolla! As applicants checked in their names were entered into a drawing and the 10 finalists were called to the stage as their names were drawn. Each finalist received one of the $1000 scholarships and chose a key from a bowl, to try to start the car with. Spectators watched with great anticipation as the first finalist, Seth Roy from Sisters High School, got in the car and put the key he had chosen into the ignition. As he turned the key over, the engine started and the entire crowd cheered! The timing couldn’t have been better for Seth, as it was his 18thbirthday that day!
Pictured are students lined up to check in for the finale, spectators anxiously watching, our 10 finalists, and of course our grand prize winner Seth, with his new Toyota Corolla!
If you missed the finale, you can see all of the action, plus interviews with each of the finalists on Zolo Media’s MyWindow Series. The Drive for Education episode will be aired on June 1st at 7pm on KBNZ and 6:00pm on KOHD
Here are our 10 Finalists:
| Parker Tugaw | Summit High School |
| Seth Roy | Sisters High School |
| Dillan Mattison | Summit High School |
| Michael Martinez | Oregon Youth Challenge Program |
| Devin Wicker | Summit High School |
| Laura Schafer | Summit High School |
| Samuel Nelson | Bend Senior High School |
| Hailey West | Burns High School |
| Sopia Jadzak | Bend Senior High School |
| Harsh Patel | Ridgeview High School |
