UpdatedMon, May 24, 2021 at 10:08 am PT
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This year, Cox Charities awarded a total of $145,500 in scholarships to 34 students statewide. (Cox Charities/Zoom Courtesy Photo)
DANA POINT, CA Cox Charities Advisory Board members surprised nine area high school seniors with scholarships to help cover college costs in a video call Friday. This is the second year in a row that Cox Charities opted to virtually announce the scholarship recipients in what they called a day of anticipation. Cox Charities is the philanthropic arm of Cox Communications and is funded by employee donations, matched by Cox, and overseen by an advisory board of employees who volunteer their time.
Five Acadiana students were named National Merit Scholars, each receiving $2,500 and distinction few can boast.
They are among only 2,500 Merit Scholars nationwide 33 in Louisiana chosen from a talent pool of some 16,000 finalists in the 2021 scholarship program.
Four hail from Lafayette Parish: Oliver Craddock of Lafayette High; Arden Frantzen of Episcopal School of Acadiana; Rafael Hernandez of Teurlings Catholic High School; and Alaina Le of St. Thomas More Catholic High School.
A fifth, AnaLaysha Burgess-Collazo, is from Jeanerette and attends the Louisiana School for Math, Science and the Arts, a public residential high school in Natchitoches.
They were selected by a committee of college admissions officers and high school counselors, who appraised a substantial amount of information submitted by the finalists and their high schools: the academic record, including difficulty level of subjects studied and grades earned; scores from the Preliminary SAT/National
Mollie Duling: 4-for-6, one-run scored
Windermere Prep
Gracie Wallace: 3-for-5, one RBI, one-run scored; 11 innings pitched, three-earned runs allowed, 21 strikeouts
Mia Williams: 4-for-5, two-stolen bases
“I’ve not been hitting well recently but when that moment came I knew I had to drive it, I had to keep my eye on the ball and I had to just get a hit I knew that,” Carr said. “It’s so crazy, I can t even explain it. I got so emotional when it happened, because I knew this team could do it I knew we could make it.”
After Wallace recorded two strikeouts she finished with a whopping 21 Ks on the night and a pop out in the bottom of the 11th, one of the first people to give her a hug was Carr, who had caught all 11 innings for the Lakers’ star pitcher.