The board of directors of the Greenbrier Valley Community Foundation (GVCF) is pleased to announce that 44 outstanding students from the public high schools in Greenbrier, Monroe and Pocahontas counties were awarded scholarships totaling over $49,000 in 2015. An additional $8,000 will be granted this fall to educational institutions and nonprofit organizations for programs that enrich our community. The grants bring the total disbursed in 2015 from funds at GVCF to over $1 million.
The Greenbrier Valley Community Foundation currently administers 38 scholarships that award money for higher education. Ten of these scholarships may be applied for directly through GVCF including the AA McLaughlin Memorial Scholarship, the Gay And Becky Shinaberry Scholarship, the Greenbrier Valley Community Foundation Scholarship, the Judith Anne O’Connor Westerik Scholarship, the Lewisburg Business And Professional Women’s Club Scholarship, the Lewisburg High School Alumni Association Scholarship, the Moore Family Philanthropic Scholarship Honoring Greenbrier Military School, the Roe Walker Family Fund/Janice Walker Pogue, Scholarship for the White Sulphur Springs Community, the Roland P. Sharp Family Memorial Scholarship and the Virgil W. Hanshaw Orphan’s Scholarship.
GVCF also administers the Mary B. Nickell Fund for Arts Education grant and its own Mini-Grant program. The Nickell grants provide funding for art enrichment in the Greenbrier County Public Schools. Educators may apply for this grant for both the fall and spring semesters. This fall’s recipients are Carli Mareneck for printmaking projects at Ronceverte Elementary School, Ross Weiseger to teach folk dancing at GEHS and Melissa Russell for a Lion Flags program at Alderson Elementary School. Mini-grants of $250 are available to any educator working in one of the public schools in Greenbrier, Monroe and Pocahontas counties. Fall grants were awarded to Angela Leef of Greenbrier West High School for an environmental science and community service project as well as to help design and build an outdoor Putt-Putt Course at GWHS, Juanita Spinks of GWHS to read and perform the play Our Town as well as for an interdisciplinary project with Angela Leef and Tim Yunker about the Buffalo Creek Disaster in Logan County, Kelli Martin to teach YogaMotion at White Sulphur Springs Elementary and the Monroe Arts Alliance to present their Annual Youth Art Show in the Monroe Public schools.
The Greenbrier Valley Community Foundation is a collection of funds that make distributions to support the charitable needs of our community. It has distributed over $3.15 million since it was established in 1999. For more information about GVCF and its grants, visit www.gvfoundation.org or contact Courtney Smith, executive director, at 304-645-5620, info@gvfoundation.org.
