City Colleges Celebrates Centennial by awarding scholarships
The City Colleges of Chicago (CCC) celebrated 100 years of existence Friday with a banquet honoring students.
U.S. Rep. Danny Davis, D-7th, Sokoni Karanja, Ph.D., and Maureen Hellwig, Ph.D., were presented with Centennial awards and 14 CCC students were awarded partial full scholarships during the celebration held at the South Shore Cultural Center. CCC Chancellor Cheryl Hyman handed out all of the awards and praised each recipient for their contributions and efforts.
Karanja is founder of the local non-profit community service organization, New Horizons. Hellwig heads programs and quality assurance at Erie Neighborhood House, a non-profit agency that provides social service assistance mostly to Latinos.
Hyman called Davis one of CCCs strongest allies before the congressman and CCC alum accepted his Centennial award.
She credited Davis with being instrumental in securing millions of dollars for predominately Black institutions throughout the nation. Kennedy-King College, Malcolm X College and Olive-Harvey three of CCCs seven schools each received grants from that pot of money.
Community colleges have been the most understated institutions of higher learning in our country, Davis said. He attended Crane Junior College, the original name of the first city-run higher education institution when the system was founded in 1911. Davis attended the school to obtain a teaching certification.
If our students make use of the city college system, they will never ever have to be a slave to anything, he added.
Davida Bankston, 47, had not been in higher education in a while when she found herself in August enrolled at Kennedy-King College. She had previously been in a nursing program at Dawson Technical Institute but left to start her family.
Now that her children are graduating one from high school and one from elementary school Bankston said its my turn to focus on educational goals.
With the $4,000 scholarship she received Friday, Bankston plans to continue her nursing aspirations, preparing for a career as not only registered a nurse, but as an instructor in a nursing program.
Financially and emotionally, getting the scholarship means an awful lot to Bankston, a resident of the Woodlawn community.
Christopher Lozano said the partial scholarship he won will help him further his education at Columbia College Chicago next fall, after graduating from CCCs Richard J. Daley College in the spring. Lozana attended Daley to get his general education courses out of the way at less cost.
The 27-year-old West Lawn resident dropped out of high school but went on to get his GED. With his college degree, Lozano is looking forward to a career involving interactive media and the arts --his college major.
This scholarship is going to make that dream I had for myself come true, Lozano said.
Hyman explained at Fridays event that some 260 students had applied for the CCC scholarships. The chosen recipients were selected from a number of criteria, including an essay and letters of recommendation.
Other scholarship recipients included: (New/incoming students) Jilliane Constante, $4,000; Laura Lespinasse, $4,000; Liliana Ruiz, $4,000; Katie Van Tilburg, $9,000; (Current students) Lewanda Anderson, Kennedy-King College, $2,500; Ronnie Barnes, Malcolm X College, $3,000; Stephanie Christopher, Harold Washington College, $4,500; Deborah Culbreth, Kennedy-King College, $2,500; Seline Goloven, Truman College, $2,500; Ron Hernandez, Malcolm X College, $2,500; Aaron Lee, Olive-Harvey College, $2,500; and Umoza Nwokeji, Olive-Harvey College, $2,500.
Over the last 100 years, City Colleges of Chicago has transformed the lives of more than one million alumni and their families through education, said Hyman. The most fitting way to celebrate our centennial is to give even more students access to [a] quality City Colleges education.
U.S. Rep. Bobby Rush, D-1st, attended the celebration. He called CCCs centennial quite an achievement.
They have provided the foundation for education and employment in this city for 100 years. Whats astounding is that the future of CCC looks so vibrant, so much potential, Rush said.
Hyman has been at the helm of CCC since 2010 when she was appointed by former Mayor Richard M. Daley. She was one of few leaders picked up to continue on in Mayor Rahm Emanuels administration, with the new mayor praising her Reinvention plan for the city college system.
The chancellors plan is an effort to overhaul Chicagos public higher education, one mired in low academic performance and achievement, and low graduation rates. Reinvention looks forward to better preparing students for four-year colleges and other careers, according to CCC.
Hyman, who graduated from Olive-Harvey College, is head of a system that began in 1911 with one school Crane Junior College and 30 students in the first class.
The Great Depression shuttered the school system for nearly a year, but it reopened as Herzl Junior College (now Malcolm X) and added two schools to the system, Wright Junior College and Wilson Junior College (now Kennedy-King). By the 1970s all seven of the current city colleges were established.
Now the $650 million system, with its 5,800 faculty and staff, and 120,000 students is the largest community college network in the state, and one of the largest in the nation.
By Rhonda Gillespie
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