Kiwanis Club of Carefree awards $280,000 in scholarships

The Kiwanis Club of Carefree hosted the 2019 Scholarship Awards Program on May 15th at the Fine Arts Center. Thirty-four local high school students were presented a total of $280,000 in various scholarships and merit awards generated from the Kiwanis Foundation including private donations channeled through the Foundation.  These graduating students will be attending a wide variety of colleges and universities across the United States. The thirty-four recipients were selected from 135 applications from four high schools after hundreds of intensive reviews by the Scholarship Committee, chaired by Janet Busbee.

The Scholarship Awards program was led by Mike Poppenwimer, President of the Kiwanis Club of Carefree. Historically, over 250 scholarships, worth over 1.8 million dollars, have been awarded by Kiwanis since 1986 to just local area students. This Awards Program follows the Kiwanis mission of “Serving the Children of our Community.” Tara Jackson, President of Arizona Town Hall, was the Keynote Speaker and gave a very inspirational speech to the Award recipients, describing how just one caring adult can change the trajectory of a child’s life.

The Kiwanis Club thanks the local community for their support of the Marketplace/Foundation through donations of gently used goods for resale, volunteering, and shopping at the Marketplace; without these efforts we would be unable to host this Scholarship Event. Last year, the Kiwanis Marketplace booked over 1.1 million dollars in sales and returned 68% of that into the local community. Kiwanis intends to continue to make a significant contribution to the children of the community.