Victoria Cook of North Laurel said the Silas Craft Collegians program, which assists students who struggled academically in high school, has made a significant difference in her college career. The program includes scholarships for all participants as well as academic support, group activities and leadership opportunities.
Despite how she fared in high school, Cook said that knowing she was accepted by the Craft program at HCC encouraged her to work harder to graduate from Reservoir High School in 2006. She said she likely would have gone to college without the program, but "I wouldn't have had the support. I would have been just another student."
Cook said that with the support, in particular, she does not have to seek a higher-paying job off campus and can instead get involved in the campus community through a job at HCC's welcome center.
Ruth Limburg of Columbia said she was discouraged when she arrived in the United States from Barbados with her infant son and could not find work.
"I felt defeated," she said. "College seemed out of the question when my son needed to eat."
But she also knew a college degree was the key to making a better life and that she wanted to be a role model for her son.
After she enrolled at HCC, Limburg, 34, received scholarships from Lockheed Martin and the McCuan Family Foundation that helped her take more classes each semester and in the summer and winter sessions. She is pursuing a degree in information systems management and plans to attend the University of Maryland, Baltimore County next year.
"Now I have a sense of accomplishment, not defeat," she told the audience at the reception.
The new scholarship Andrew Goresh established in his wife's memory has not been awarded yet, but he said he is eager to hear a success story next year.
Pamela Makowski Goresh had a passion for writing and, after earning a master's degree when she was in her 50s, a strong desire to teach others. She was excited to get a position teaching first-year composition at HCC, Andrew Goresh said.
"She wanted to see people as excited about writing as she was, and hopefully make their paths easier than hers," he said.
Pamela Goresh taught for only a few months before she died of cancer. Her husband established the $1,000 annual scholarship with donations from friends, families and some of Pamela's students. It will benefit a student, chosen by the English department, who shows promise as a writer.
Goresh, a human resources consultant from Columbia, said next year's donor/student reception will be "an opportunity to meet a student and see [the result of] what is intended to be a gift to the future." The scholarship is an opportunity to "create a legacy, a living legacy," he said.
"It is a rekindling of the contribution she wanted to make," Goresh said.
