An Emotional Awards Night

A big thank you to Mary Ryan for presenting this year’s scholarship award to Jillian Fahey at the Davis High School Senior Awards Night on Tuesday. 

 As Jillian’s grandmother, Diana Fahey, reports:

 “Mrs. Ryan was the presenter.  She was very emotional.  It was so sweet.  She said Mrs. Neu was Jillian's kindergarten and first grade teacher and I am sure she would be pleased she was getting this award.  The audience gave an awwwww.  It was the only one of the evening.  Mrs. Ryan was crying.  Thank you for this opportunity.”

It was a fortunate set of circumstances that we were able to get Mary to present. It’s as if it was meant to be.

Experiences like this are what we hoped to bring about when we launched the memorial scholarship fund in my mother’s name.

It’s great to learn that it’s working as intended.

Thanks again to Mary Ryan and all who support our efforts with the scholarship to make this possible.

And congratulations again to Jillian Fahey. We wish you well with your studies in biology at Chapman University.

Tomorrow is the Deadline

April 5 is the deadline for the 2019 scholarship application.  

If you’re eligible, it’s not too late. $1,850 toward your college tuition can never hurt.

Submit the completed application, transcript and any additional materials on or before April 5, 2019 to:

Davis Senior High School Career Center
315 W 14th St, Davis, CA 95616
Attention: Julie Clayton
(530) 757-5400, ext. 140
jclayton@djusd.net

See related post for more details and application. 

Congratulations to Ryan Everitt!

Congratulations to Ryan Everitt, the second recipient of the Barbara Neu Memorial Scholarship. He will be officially honored at Senior Awards Night on Tuesday, May 29 (6:00pm in Davis Senior High School’s Richard Brunelle Performance Hall). 

Ryan attended Fairfield from 2006-2009, having Mrs Neu for his first two years and Mrs Ryan for his second two. After graduating from Davis Senior High School this year, Ryan plans to study film, television production and theater arts at Boston University. He dreams of performing on Broadway. 

Linda Book helped Ryan learn that he loved to sing while at Fairfield and Mrs Neu helped him overcome being embarrassed to sing around others. 

“Initially, I was too shy to even move around. I had my fists clenched in fright, jaw locked shut, and my eyes wide. I scanned the crowd and spotted Mrs Neu. We made eye contact, and she could see how petrified I was to be in front of an audience. She gave me a warm smile that melted my fears. ‘The Hummingbird Song’ began to play, and I could not possibly resist the urge to rock out about the hummingbird stuck in someone’s nose. As ridiculous as it was, I felt comfortable to just enjoy sharing the stage with other people that I cared about and who cared about me. ”

— From Ryan Everitt, 2018 Barbara Neu Memorial Scholarship winner.

Click here if you don't know the Hummingbird Song.

Judging from the clip below, Ryan has definitely overcome his fear of singing on stage. 

Ryan Everitt performing "Donny Novitski" from the musical, "Bandstand", composed by Richard Oberacker. This is a clip of him performing in the Davis Senior High School Jazz Choir Annual Cabaret Dinner.

We wish Ryan all the best with making his dream come true.

Five Applications are In!

Julie Clayton at Davis Senior High School tells us: "I’m happy to report that I received five applications on Friday for the scholarship!"  Scholarship applications typically come in on deadline day, we are told.

Now the fun of deciding begins. Stay tuned. 

Tell us how a teacher has made a difference in your life

One of the requirements for the Barbara Neu Memorial Scholarship application is submitting one or more paragraphs on how a teacher made a difference in your life (remember the application deadline is April 6, look here for more info).

Many people take the time to recognize teachers that made an impact on them. For example, here is an excerpt from a blog post by Bill Gates:

“When I first met Mrs. Caffiere, she was the elegant and engaging school librarian at Seattle’s View Ridge Elementary, and I was a timid fourth grader. I was desperately trying to go unnoticed, because I had some big deficits, like atrocious handwriting (experts now call it dysgraphia) and a comically messy desk. And I was trying to hide the fact that I liked to read—something that was cool for girls but not for boys.

Mrs. Caffiere took me under her wing and helped make it okay for me to be a messy, nerdy boy who was reading lots of books.

She pulled me out of my shell by sharing her love of books. She started by asking questions like, “What do you like to read?” and “What are you interested in?” Then she found me a lot of books—ones that were more complex and challenging than the Tom Swift Jr. science fiction books I was reading at the time. For example, she gave me great biographies she had read. Once I’d read them, she would make the time to discuss them with me. “Did you like it?” she would ask. “Why? What did you learn?” She genuinely listened to what I had to say. Through those book conversations in the library and in the classroom we became good friends.

Teachers generally don’t want to burden their students with extra reading beyond the homework they’ve assigned. But I learned from Mrs. Caffiere that my teachers had so much more knowledge to share. I just needed to ask. Up through high school and beyond, I would often ask my teachers about the books they liked, read those books when I had some free time, and offer my thoughts.

Looking back on it now, there’s no question that my time with Mrs. Caffiere helped spark my interest in libraries (Melinda’s and my first large-scale effort in philanthropy) and my focus on helping every child in America get the benefit of great teachers. I often trace the beginning of our foundation to an article about children in poor countries dying from diseases eliminated long ago in the U.S. But I should give some credit as well to the dedicated librarian and teacher who helped me find my strengths when I was nine years old. It’s remarkable how much power one good person can have in shaping the life of a child. ”

— A Teacher Who Changed My Life By Bill Gates | August 16, 2016

If I think about my own situation, there are many teachers that have had an impact. The one that stands out most for me growing up is Don Hartman, who was my sixth-grade teacher at Pioneer Elementary School. Mr. Hartman had a number of traditions that are forever etched in my mind.

The first being his reading books to the class. He could have had a career in audiobooks if he wanted to because I can still hear him reading passages from The Cay and The White Mountains in my head to this day.

There was also this green-light, red-light system that signified when you could talk to friends (we often played Hearts) and move about the class (green light) and when it was time for quiet and work (red light) 

Another impactful thing was his love of technical things and mechanical drawings. Buiding and launching model rockets is something that he introduced me to, plus he would produce technical drawings on command of things like fighter jets and railroad locomotives (this, during green-light time) using pencil and paper. It was through this that I learned he liked to make model railroad locomotives, which resulted in having him create a replica of the one my grandfather (Mrs Neu's father) drove on his last run for the Western Pacific before he retired as a railroad engineer (see below).  

Don Hartman's replica of my grandfather's last-run locomotive before he retired.

Finally, and in retrospect, the most impactful thing Mr. Hartman taught me was to strive for excellence. It was the stickers. He had this system of rewarding the quality of work on assignments with a hierarchy of stickers, which included things like state flags, but with the ultimate prize of receiving a president sticker.  Those were very rare and extremely coveted. He may have given us grades, too, I don't remember, but I do remember striving for a president sticker and the feeling of accomplishment when finally receiving one. Doing well in school was a never topped after that, and I wish I still had one of those stickers to show for my effort, or, better still, I wish I had the opportunity to earn another one. Thanks, Mr. Hartman.

If you are not applying for the Barbara Neu Memorial Scholarship this year, and you still want to tell us about a teacher who made a difference in your life, please do so in the comments below. 

Fund Passes the $60,000 Level

We are happy to report that the Barbara Neu Memorial Scholarship Fund has exceeded the $60k threshold with a fund balance of $60,707. We have received donations since the fund's inception of $55,116.

Photo by kemalbas/iStock / Getty Images

Thank you to all who have contributed!

Siblings and the Fairfield Experience

One of the questions on the Barbara Neu Memorial Scholarship application is "Did any of your siblings also attend Fairfield School?" This is for good reason since siblings tend to be a big part of the Fairfield experience.

Many families enjoy the Fairfield experience so much, or siblings want so much to have the same experience as an older brother or sister, that it becomes a shared family one.

Since most students attend by choice, via an application process, siblings attending Fairfield is a bit different than when they attend the same elementary school based on where they live.

Also, as a small, two-classroom school, you are generally in much closer proximity to your brother or sister than at most other schools (should you be close enough in age to attend at the same time). 

And, finally, the teacher connection to siblings because of the small, two-classroom environment is almost guaranteed.

All of this is part of why Mrs Neu loved Fairfield.

Time for the Second Scholarship

The Barbara Neu Memorial Scholarship Fund is accepting applications for its second award grant ($1,250). We are pleased to be working again with Julie Clayton at the David Senior High School Career to award this year's scholarship. Applications are being accepted through April 6.

We've been able to raise this year's scholarship grant to $1,250 (keep the donations coming so we can keep giving more)!

To apply, you can download the application by clicking on the image below or visit Julie Clayton at the Davis Senior High School Career Center, 315 W 14th St, Davis, CA 95616. If you need to contact her dial 530-757-5400, ext. 140.

In order to ensure your application is received for processing, Julie suggests that you bring it to her in person by the deadline: April 6, 2018. 

Click on the image above to download the pdf. 

Eligibility

To be eligible for consideration to receive a Barbara Neu Memorial Scholarship, you must:

•  Have attended Fairfield Elementary School in Davis, California (part of the DJUSD) and be able to provide evidence of such attendance satisfactory to the fund’s Selection Committee;
• Complete and sign the Barbara Neu Memorial Scholarship Fund Application Form and submit it together with a recent transcript and at least one letter of recommendation the fund’s Selection Committee before the applicable annual submission date, as provided on the application form; and
• Agree to use any Barbara Neu Memorial Scholarship Fund scholarship award solely for tuition and/or fees, books and supplies at a valid educational institution for the educational purpose identified in the application form.    

Given the Davis Senior High School Career Center's administration of the 2018 award, recipients will be limited to high school seniors at Davis Senior High or Leonardo da Vinci High School in Davis, CA. 

The scholarship award selection will be made in mid-April and the recipient will be notified thereafter, or by the end of April. Official recognition will occur at the Davis Senior High School Senior Awards Night on May 29, 2018.

We look forward to meeting this year's winner! 

An Update From Liam

We recently received an update from Liam Schroth, the first Barbara Neu Memorial Scholarship recipient, and he’s given us permission to share it.

“Dear Neu Family,

As I’m about to start my second semester at Sonoma State, I thought I’d take some time to update all of you on how I’ve been putting the scholarship to use.

I’ve become as involved as I possibly can in my major. When the semester started, I hurried to finish all the curriculum available to me in the one computer science class I was in as soon as I could. After that, I showed my professor what I’d done and asked what more there was I could do for the rest of the semester. He then introduced me to a research project he’s been working on for a few years, and offered for me to help him produce documentation and examples of his work, which I would then be able to present at a cybersecurity conference later in the year. I then spent the rest of the semester doing just that, and at this point, I’m essentially prepared to create a poster board with everything I worked on and travel to new places to show it off alongside other students from CSU schools. I’ll be attending both the IEEE Security and Privacy Conference in San Francisco as well as the Consortium for Computing Science in College at Harvey Mudd College in Claremont.

I’m really excited to share what I’ve produced/learned and I hope this story can encourage you to continue this scholarship program to enable more people like me to research what we’re passionate about. I want to thank you once again for the opportunity that the Neu Scholarship has helped provide me. I carry all that Mrs. Neu taught me every step of the way.

Sincerely,

Liam Schroth”

Keep up the good work, Liam. 

Awards Night Recognition for First Scholarship Recipient

The first Barbara Neu Memorial Scholarship recipient Liam Schroth was recognized at the Davis Senior High School Senior Awards Night on May 30. 

Congratulations once more to Liam!

Just Short of our $50K Goal

Back in March, we made a push to boost the Barbara Neu Memorial Scholarship Fund to $50k. This would allow us to up or double the scholarship award for next year. We came up just short of our goal with a fund balance of $48,730.14. 

This is very close... and we thank everyone for their support of the Mrs Neu Fund.

The First Scholarship Recipient

Congratulations to Liam Schroth, the first recipient of the Barbara Neu Memorial Scholarship!

We are very excited to have the first scholarship recipient named. My father and sister will be there when Liam is honored at the Davis Senior High School Senior Awards Night on Tuesday, May 30 at the Richard Brunelle Theater. His story is one of finding your passion and speaks to how important it is to keep sailing even when conditions aren't the best for you.

Liam attended Fairfield School from 2004-2008. Mrs Neu was his teacher for K-1 and he had Mrs Ryan for 2-3. Liam's brother Adam also attended Fairfield from 2006-2010, which shows that Liam's parents Brian Schroth and Leslie Anastassatos were Fairfield fans. Liam certainly was: 

“Fairfield was the most intimate school I ever attended. I doubt I’ll every experience running around in a large field with hundreds of kids whose names I know all of again at any other school. This was always a tradition at community events at the school. Everyone would run out on the grass field and play tag or any other game that everybody could participate in equally.”

Asked about how a teacher made a difference in his life, Liam noted the following:

“Mrs Neu was determined not to let any single student feel left behind or waiting ahead. She didn’t compromise to one-size-fits-all standards. When we were learning to read, we would sit down with a book and try to learn until we knew enough words to read it ourselves. We weren’t sitting in rows of desks in a dungeon reading until we met the requirements; we sat down and read what she believed we could read. . . . When I excelled at reading faster than most of the kids in the class, Mrs Neu didn’t tell me to wait or to ‘hang out’ and enjoy being ahead. She simply gave me another book and sent me back to my seat. This method of teaching taught me that I can do anything and that the limits teachers will place on my learning environment can never truly stifle someone with genuine enthusiasm.”

Mrs Neu would surely be proud to see that Liam was able to embrace learning with enthusiasm even after experiencing challenges with his learning environment.  

“Throughout high school, I learned that I am not the kind of person who high school was designed with in mind. I found that the traditional classroom environment doesn’t suit me as well as some other learning styles and that I don’t always have the same motivation as those around me. . . . While most of the students in my class found their groove and started pumping out A’s before high school started, it took me several years to find mine, and I’ve learned a lot about myself in the process. Over the years, I’ve accepted that that’s alright and that once I find something that truly motivates me, it’ll all get easier.”

Upon graduation from Davis Senior High School, Liam plans to major in computer science after recently discovering a passion for computers by learning to create home servers to stream music and host games from some old computers lying around his house. He taught himself how to set them up using online tutorials and this led to taking programming, network and server administration courses at Sacramento City College. He plans to attend Sonoma State University after graduation. Liam is looking forward to college as an environment to meet new people and apply what he has learned about himself.

Liam already has a sense for the type of job he wants after college:

“I have had the chance to evaluate what kind of work I prefer: what exhausts me more, what is more fulfilling, what is the least monotonous.”

Liam is also enthusiastic about sailing. He learned to sail in local sailing clubs (Lake Washington and Stonegate) and participated in summer programs to help the instructors. This has led to him being named lead instructor for both sailing clubs this summer. It has always been his dream to work with sailboats in the bay area and he hopes to find a sailing job while in college. 

“While I love computers and want to become as employable as possible in that industry, I will always have a soft spot in my heart for sailing.”

There is a lot in Liam's application that makes him a great choice for the first Barbara Neu Memorial Scholarship. Liam, we hope it helps you find some wind at your back, but don't ever lose your courage to sail into headwinds. 

Today is the Day!

This is the day, beyond which we will have the first recipient of the Barbara Neu Memorial Scholarship in hand.  

Reminder to Prospective Scholarship Applicants: Deadline Friday!

As a reminder to prospective applicants for the first-ever award of the Barbara Neu Memorial Scholarship, the application deadline is this Friday. 

More details can be found here.

Boost the Mrs Neu Fund To $50K

Join us, if you can, in pushing the fund to $50,000. We will match all donations made until we reach a $50,000 fund balance through March 30, 2017.

As excited as we are to be awarding a $1,000 Barbara Neu Memorial Scholarship this year, we still want to do more. Pushing the fund balance over $50,000 would get us close to being able to double the scholarship or the scholarship amount next year. 

Supporting the alumni of Fairfield Elementary School 

To donate, click on the donate button below and select the YCF - Barbara Neu Memorial Scholarship from the "Please use my donation for" dropdown list. Or, send a check payable to the same to: 

Barbara Neu Memorial Scholarship Fund of Yolo Community Foundation
c/o Sacramento Region Community Foundation
955 University Avenue, Suite A
Sacramento, CA 95825 

Thank you for your support!

Help Move the Scholarship Fund to $50,000

Mrs Neu's birthday is March 19, next Sunday, and she would have turned 77. We are also coming on a year from her passing on March 30.

Join us, if you can, in pushing the fund to $50,000 in recognition of these milestones. We will match all donations made until we reach a $50,000 fund balance through March 30, 2017.

As excited as we are to be awarding a $1,000 Barbara Neu Memorial Scholarship this year, we still want to do more. Pushing the fund balance over $50,000 would get us close to being able to double the scholarship or the scholarship amount next year. 

The fund balance currently stands at $35,114.01, with gifts to date of $34,865. This puts us just under $15,000 from a $50,000 goal.

This is the fund summary as of March 9, 2017 (with the 2017 scholarship grant paid out).

To donate, click on the donate button below and select the YCF - Barbara Neu Memorial Scholarship from the "Please use my donation for" dropdown list. Or, send a check payable to the same to: 

Barbara Neu Memorial Scholarship Fund of Yolo Community Foundation
c/o Sacramento Region Community Foundation
955 University Avenue, Suite A
Sacramento, CA 95825 

Thank you for your support!

More Scholarship Details and Application

Following a conversation this week with Julie Clayton of the Davis Senior High School Career Center (who is helping administer the scholarship award; thanks, Julie), we have some additional details to share about the $1,000 Barbara Neu Memorial Scholarship.

First, applications are due on April 7, 2017.  As noted before, applications can be picked up at the Davis Senior High School Career Center, 315 W 14th St, Davis, CA 95616 or you may use the application below. 

In order to ensure your application is received for processing, Julie suggests that you bring it to her in person by the deadline. 

Given the Davis Senior High School Career Center's administration of the 2017 award, recipients will be limited to high school seniors at Davis Senior High or Leonardo da Vinci High School in Davis, CA. 

The scholarship award selection will be made on April 18-19 and the recipient will be notified thereafter, or by the end of April. Official recognition will occur at the Davis Senior High School Senior Awards Night on May 30, 2017.  

The Application is available in the Box folder below, both as a simple pdf and a pdf form.

If you are unable to access Box, these files are also on Dropbox here. 

Barbara Neu Memorial Scholarship Available Now!

Updated details can be found here.

We are pleased to announce that the Barbara Neu Memorial Scholarship is live! A scholarship of $1,000 is available to be awarded this year. Applications are currently available at the Davis Senior High School's Career Center. You can also contact Julie Clayton for more details: jclayton@djusd.net

The Barbara Neu Memorial Scholarship supports alumni of Fairfield Elementary School in the Davis Joint Unified School District in their pursuit of a degree from an accredited college; university; or technical, trade or vocational school. 

To be eligible, you must have attended Fairfield Elementary School and be a high school senior; a current undergraduate or graduate school student; a high school graduate pursuing a technical, trade, or vocational school; or an adult re-entry student. 

The application will have full details on the application process, which includes a personal essay on your favorite Fairfield memory and future goals, a letter of recommendation and transcripts that also confirm your attendance at Fairfield.

To get the scholarship awards started, we have asked the Davis High School Scholarship Committee to make the impartial selection this year. Their selection will be made based on academic potential and merit, the personal essay, the letter of recommendation and the number of years the applicant attended Fairfield.

We will update you with more details soon. 

Thanks again to everyone who has supported the Barbara Neu Memorial Scholarship Fund to make this possible!

Profiles of Scholarship Recipients

One of the things we would like to do in awarding Barbara Neu Memorial scholarships is to profile recipients. To make this easy, we might have applicants submit profile information with their application. 

The annual newsletter for the Chris Borton Memorial Scholarship Fund does a nice job of profiling scholarship recipients-- both new recipients on their study and life plans going forward and updates on past recipients. 

A 2016 recipient of the Chris Borton Memorial Scholarship

The Chris Borton Memorial Scholarship Fund was established to assist University of California San Diego students wishing to study abroad. The scholarship was initiated in 1996, by Chris's good friend and fellow UCSD graduate Mike Scanlin, who proposed the idea of a memorial scholarship to Chris' parents Ray and Verena Borton shortly after Chris' death from cancer.

Through the Education Abroad Program of UCSD, Chris spent a year at the University of Göttingen in Germany, an experience that profoundly influenced the direction of his life. Together with his childhood experiences of living in different cultures and later studies and travels abroad, it made him the world citizen he was.

Now in its 20th year, the Chris Borton Memorial Scholarship has benefited 61 UCSD students. Well done!

A scene from the Georg-August University in Göttingen

As I also participated in the Education Abroad Program, while at UCSB, and also at Göttingen (just after Chris), I can attest to its profound influence. My brother is also an EAP alum (Vienna).

Please visit the Chris Borton Memorial Scholarship Fund website and consider contributing to this worthy cause. 

Happy New Year, 2017!

The Barbara Neu Memorial Scholarship Fund starts the new year some $2,000 richer, with some appreciated year-end donations. Thank you!

This sets the tone for a Happy New Year, which we wish all of you too. A busy end of 2016 got us off-track with setting up the scholarship committee, but we hope to get this fixed, starting this month, by establishing the selection criteria.

We absolutely will award a scholarship in 2017.