Community Scholarship Fund marks 20th anniversary

BY HALEY LENA HLENA@COLORADOCOMMUNITYMEDIA.COM

As the Highlands Ranch Community Association celebrated the 20th anniversary of the Community Scholarship Fund in April, 20 students from various high schools around the community were awarded scholarships.

In 2003, the association created the Community Scholarship Fund to provide post-secondary education scholarships to graduating Highlands Ranch residents and for individuals with special needs.

For the past two decades, the Highlands Ranch Community Association has provided more than $651,000 to 402 recipients — high school graduates, those facing adversity and the community’s erapeutic Recreation Department.

“ e nice thing about this, it’s not funded with assessment dollars,” said Mike Bailey, the Highlands Ranch Community Association general manager. “ is is funded through our fundraising events.”

According to Bailey, the biggest fundraising event is the Beer Festival, which raised more than $50,000 last year.

Scholarships are awarded to those who have shown community leadership through volunteerism in and outside of school, have been involved in extracurricular activities and have demonstrated to be wellrounded students and residents. e scholarship aims to help individuals explore leisure interests, develop skills, have fun and enhance the quality of life for families.

Coordinated through the Highlands Ranch Community Association’s erapeutic Recreation Department, scholarships are also awarded to those with special needs.

“ rough this extraordinary relationship with CSF (Community is year, sta at the Highlands Ranch Community Association reached out to the administrators and counselors at local high schools to nominate deserving candidates. is spring, the Community Scholarship Fund granted 20 $2,500 scholarships to recipients at six high schools. e 2023 Community Scholarship

Scholarship Fund), we award scholarships to our students with special needs who need nancial assistance to join groups or for personal instruction,” said Bailey in a press release.

Fund includes four recipients from Highlands Ranch High School, four from Rock Canyon, ve from Mountain Vista, ve from underRidge, one from Arapahoe and one from Valor Christian High School.

Although there was not a banquet to celebrate the recipients this year as the community is continuing to come back from the pandemic, Bailey plans to have one next year.

“We are going to resurrect that next year and have a formal banquet again,” said Bailey. “For next year, we’re going to probably commence that in the month of April.”