Meet Our Scholarship Recipients

Thanks to generous support from alumni and friends, Lurie College was able to award 111 students a total of $274,000 for the 2019-2020 academic year, with an average award of $2469 and a median award of $1000. These awards are becoming even more critical during a time when our communities need transformative educators, counselors, therapists, school and community leaders and when so many of our students are experiencing financial hardships.

Gather some insights about five of our amazing 2019-2020 scholarship recipients on these two pages and watch their video interviews at sjsu.edu/education/give, where you can also make a gift that can impact the trajectory of our students’ lives!

Jennifer Villegas Lopez BA, Child & Adolescent Development

“What I’ll remember the most is the friendly, welcoming, and inspiring environment that my department has to offer. The staff here are such an inspiration to me and I see myself being like them one day. They’re such a great example of being motivators for students. I’ll also remember all of the fun events. They’re so fun and it’s a way to meet other peers and create those connections that will be very beneficial in the long run.”

Nicole Ellis MA, Counseling & Guidance

“The last two years in my grad program have been the most introspective and reflective time of my life. I’ve been able to grow in so many different ways by honing in on what my passions are, what my purpose is, and my ‘why’ for doing this work. There have been so many opportunities to grow my confidence, specifically in finding my voice.”

Christian Ponce MA & Multiple Subject Credential

“For our credential and master’s program, we were sent out into the field to teach for two semesters. Towards the end of my first semester, some of the kids wrote me letters when I finished student teaching and one of them left me a letter saying that they’ve never had a male teacher before and that it was really cool and they hoped they could have me as a teacher in the future. That was really cool for me because I knew I had made an impact.”

Allyson Landreth Single Subject Credential

“I knew I wanted to pursue a career in education pretty early on when I was a sophomore in high school. I had the privilege of being in a program called BioSITE where I was able to mentor 4th grade students in an outdoor setting. We were able to engage with them and teach them science concepts like environmental stewardship and that really opened my mind to education.”

Leslye Tinson Ed.D., Educational Leadership

“One word I would use to describe education is ‘Fun.’ I think that education is something that we may approach from a very serious perspective, especially as college students and doctoral students, but the other part is remembering to have fun and remembering to embrace this as an experience like other experiences, remembering to be inquisitive, to be curious...and taking the time to build relationships with the people that wil ultimately be my colleagues.” 7