As Warren Easton Charter High School celebrated another graduating class Monday, several high-performing seniors walked away with a little extra cushion for their college funds.
Twenty-two seniors received scholarships totaling $58,500 this month, thanks to a program overseen by the board of directors’ Hall of Fame committee.
“Out of every single interviewee, there weren’t any bad ones,” said board member David Benelli, who helped review the 41 scholarship applications.
The scholarships were presented as part of the school’s Hall of Fame annual induction ceremony, which honors past Warren Easton graduates in addition to future ones.
Board president David Garland said he volunteered with the scholarship selection process for the first time this year. He was most impressed by the students’ writing abilities.
“It’s absolutely stunning, the kids we have at this school,” he said. “It made you proud to be an Eagle, that’s for sure.”
The committee’s scholarship recipients weren’t the only ones honored at Warren Easton recently. Senior Geremy Williams recently won the district’s Premier Stay in School Program, which partners with the Premier Automotive Group to recognize seniors who have perfect attendance.
For his perfect record, Williams got a 2013 Toyota Scion, given away by Troy Duhon, the owner of Toyota/Scion of New Orleans.
Although most of the meeting focused on student achievement, one guest attending the meeting said that he wanted to make the school’s student population even more successful.
Ced Scott came towards the end of the meeting to promote his mentoring program, Blue House Ventures, aimed at young men ages 14 to 18.
Scott says he’s worked at several schools over the past two years, helping students deal with social issues.
“I created it out of a need I had in life. I grew up fatherless,” Scott said, explaining that he would like to work with Warren Easton’s “problem students,” if there’s a need.
Board members said they would take his proposal into consideration.
During the meeting, Garland directed the conversation towards student health, mentioning concerns he had about the number of students attending the school’s dental clinic.
“We’ve seen a drop off in the number of students, and we’d like to find ways to increase participation,” Garland said. “We’d like to educate the parents about what we have here.”
Garland mentioned that there wasn’t any information about the clinic on the school’s website.
He has asked the board to start gathering information so the school can have a web page about the clinic, including its history and funding. He also wants more information about Dr. Troy Patterson, the clinic’s dentist, and his private dental programs.
Garland said he wanted the parents to be informed about the restrictions and benefits of using the dental clinic if students have a Medicaid program, but are also interested in future visits at a private dentist’s office.
“I had no idea we just had this gigantic gap on our own web page showing one of the great features of this school,” Garland said. “It should be one of the prominent things we show here.”
In addition to Garland and Bennelli, board members John Broussard, Billy Hatchett and Brenda Christiansen were in attendance, as well as ex officios Sal Genovese and Arthur Hardy. The meeting lasted for about an hour and a half.