Kiwanians give $2,000 in scholarships
Matt Cook, Managing Editor05-23-2008
With rising gas prices, the higher cost of merchandise due to inflation and the unavoidable increase in college tuition, it’s nice to see the Ennis Kiwanis Club helping out in one of those areas.Members came together for their regularly scheduled meeting Thursday at the I.O.O.F. Center, where the group gave out $2,000 in scholarships to two Ennis seniors.Erica Banks and Justin Munn were the lucky recipients of the Wesley Knize Memorial Scholarship, named after a founding member of the Ennis Kiwanis Club.
“This is a culmination of everything we do,” Kiwanis Member Lee Johnson said. “It is a great thing we can do to honor past members who are no longer with us.”Fittingly, half of the fund was endowed by Ellis County Judge Gene Knize , whose late father is the scholarship’s namesake.
Kiwanis Member and Scholarship Committee Chairman Dorothy Holt said the club considered seven applicants for the scholarship, and decided Banks and Munn were the most deserving candidates.Banks is Ennis High School’s Key Club President and is ranked 25th in her class. She said she was surprised to be elected president for her senior year since she has only been in Ennis about three years.She has worked diligently to have the Key Club be active in the community and she is proud of what they have accomplished. Banks said she plans to attend Spelman College in Atlanta.Munn is this year’s salutatorian and will be attending the University of Texas at Austin. Munn has been in Key Club for three years, serving as president his junior year of high school.“I really appreciate this scholarship,” Munn said. “Thank you.”
The students will receive $500 each per semester for the first year of their collegiate career.This was the Kiwanis Club’s first meeting since its Hamburger Day fund-raiser, which President Ellen Miller said had raised about $5,000.“This old group couldn’t have done that without the Key Club,” Miller said about the help it received from Ennis High School students.The Ennis Kiwanis Club meets Thursday at noon at the Odd Fellow and Rebekah Retirement Center.
