Representatives from Sacred Ground met with Jessica Thompson, Executive Director of the Germanna Educational Foundation, for lunch at Castiglias in Fredericksburg on Oct. 10, 2023. The goal was to determine how we could move forward with a new focus on our scholarships for students.
There are both academic and workforce tracks at Germanna. We are looking at the latter which may provide more scholarships. Germanna may have a problem with the terms of our scholarship, however, which specifies awarding scholarships to Afro-Americans or Native Americans who have a financial need.
The Supreme Court by a 6–3 vote, on June 29, held that the use of race in two university’s admissions processes violated the Equal Protection Clause and Title VI of the Civil Rights Act. Jessica said we would have to open the scholarships to all but Germanna could present possible candidates to us that fit our criteria
Another issue was our stipulation of a high school graduate or one with a GED. Many high school students are doing the workforce training before they leave high school so that when they graduate from high school they earn both a high school diploma and a degree in a trade. We will amend our scholarship to include high school students that want to apply for the workforce track
The workforce classes are often funded from state grants and other grants but the student generally pays for 1/3 which is the need. That’s where our scholarship would come probably $500 to $1,000 per student.
Moving forward, we hope to get a list of students by the end of November, 2023 for review.
We had 10 people from St. Peter’s who met with her.
