The Waldo County Extension Association (WCEA) has exceeded the $6,000 fundraising goal required to earn a $6,000 matching gift from the Maine 4-H Foundation. These funds are the beginning of a larger effort to provide ongoing support for the scholarship awarded to a Waldo County graduate each year. 

In the year ahead, the WCEA will seek support from Waldo County residents, businesses and organizations to raise the balance needed to meet the $30,000 goal set by the Association’s Board of Directors. Until recently, the $1,500 scholarship was funded by proceeds from Rural Living Day, WCEA’s annual celebration of rural life. When it became clear that event cancellations during the pandemic would deplete scholarship reserves, the Board began exploring other ways to fund the program. Conversations with the Maine 4-H Foundation led to the matching challenge that kick-started the campaign. Now that the challenge has been met, the WCEA will focus on securing donations from the community it serves.

“We feel fortunate that the 4-H Foundation understood the importance of this scholarship to students and families in Waldo County and offered to assist us in securing its future,” said Honorary Campaign Chair Rick Kersbergen, retired Waldo County agriculture educator, in a news release. “With the rising costs of higher education, this scholarship may enhance the options open to the student who receives it each year.”

“This scholarship is helping me pay to better my education and helping me meet my career goal,” says Madison Roux, the scholarship’s most recent recipient. Roux, a 2023 graduate of Mount View High School in Thorndike, is studying to become an advanced practice psychiatric nurse at Husson University.

Waldo County residents entering their first or second year of post-secondary education are eligible to apply for the scholarship, which is due April 1. Applicants must be pursuing a career in a field that supports Extension’s mission “to help Maine people improve their lives through an educational process that uses research-based knowledge.” Examples of eligible fields of study include, but are not limited to, agriculture, horticulture, crop science, animal sciences, natural resource conservation, environmental sciences, home economics, nutrition, food systems, preventative health, youth development and education.

For further information, contact Sadee Mehuren at 207-342-5971. To make a donation, visit extension.umaine.edu/waldo/wcea-scholarship/#donate.

University of Maine Cooperative Extension:

As a trusted resource for over 100 years, Extension has supported UMaine’s land and sea grant public education role by conducting community-driven, research-based programs in every Maine county. Extension seeks to build thriving communities and grow the food-based economy, focusing on aspects from production and processing to nutrition, food safety and food security. Extension also conducts the most successful out-of-school youth educational program in Maine through 4-H which offers hands-on projects in areas like health, science, agriculture and civic engagement and creates a positive environment where participants are encouraged to take on proactive leadership roles.