Are you planning to attend Southwestern Oregon Community College in the 2023-24 academic year? If so, you are encouraged to apply for scholarships!
Thanks to generous donors, the Southwestern Oregon Community College Foundation awards nearly $200,000 in scholarships annually to students attending Southwestern. Any student planning to attend college during the 2023-24 academic year is encouraged to apply. This includes both full-time and part-time students.
Applications are available annually January 1 – March 1. For all the details and to apply, visit www.socc.edu/scholarships.
One application will automatically apply students to all the scholarships to which they qualify.
Early bird incentive! Applications submitted by 11:59 p.m. on February 1 are eligible to qualify for an additional $1,000 scholarship.
All applications are DUE BY 11:59 P.M. on MARCH 1, 2023. No exceptions.
Questions about Southwestern Foundation scholarships? Contact foundation@socc.edu or call 541-888-7209.
The Southwestern Oregon Community College Foundation and the College’s Department of Nursing invite all nurses in the local community to an open house on Wednesday, November 16, 2022, from 11 a.m. – 1 p.m. The event, “A Celebration of Nursing,” will take place in the nursing wing of Southwestern’s new Umpqua Hall.
Current faculty and students will provide tours of the College’s new nursing lab. Practicing and retired LPN/LVNs, RNs, APRNs and nursing alumni/faculty are encouraged to network, connect with peers and help inspire the next generation of nurses.
“We have an amazing group of nurses practicing here in our local community. They know, first-hand, what it takes to make it through school,” said Joannie Miller, Executive Director of Nursing at Southwestern. “Our own students are motivated by seeing their success. This event provides a unique opportunity to facilitate those connections, showcase our new labs and simply have fun celebrating our profession.”
Guided by a board of community volunteers, the Southwestern Foundation organized as a nonprofit organization in 1962, the year after the college started. Since then, thousands of students have attended the college using Foundation scholarships. These awards inspire students to achieve their goals and give back to our community.
Community health care organizations interested in hosting an information table at the event are welcome to do so with a minimum $100 donation through the Southwestern Foundation. Donations to serve as a sponsor may be submitted at www.socc.edu/give, and designate “nursing event sponsor” in the notes section.
If you are interested in donating to Southwestern Foundation nursing scholarships, simply visit www.socc.edu/give or call 541-888-7211 for additional information.
Southwestern Oregon Community College has many trees on its Coos Bay campus. There are native firs, pines, maples, alders and a majestic coastal redwood.
There is one tree, however, that is unique. A Hiroshima Peace Tree.
“This tree symbolizes our college’s and our community’s long history of friendship and trade with people from around the world,” said Carolyn Thompson, of the SWOCC Foundation.
Thompson opened a dedication ceremony Oct. 1 with the foundation, college students and staff, and community members. Together, they marked the day the college officially joined with more than 30 other Oregon communities as having planted ginkgoes through the Hiroshima Peace Tree project. The small, leafy trees will grow to 40 feet tall or more. Bigger than that, the ginkgoes are symbols of peace grown from seeds of trees that survived the nuclear bombing in Hiroshima, Japan, in 1945.
Oregon Department of Forestry, in partnership with the Medford-based nonprofit One Sunny Day Initiatives, provided the ginkgoes as gifts to schools, parks and public places. Through this effort, Oregon has one of the largest collections of Hiroshima peace trees outside of Japan.
“It’s inspiring to me to have a tree planted here that to me symbolizes hope,” SWOCC President Patty Scott said. “People going to college are hopeful, and we are hopeful for their futures.”
60 Years Of Forming Friendships
This year, Southwestern is celebrating its 60th anniversary and over the decades, the college has been engaged in international work and exchange, according to Scott. International students come to Coos Bay to study, participate in athletics and live in the community. This year, 33 international students are living at the college. Several of those students, along with members of student government and a veteran student came to the event and helped unveil the tree.
While most people at the gathering were not alive during World War II, Scott said many people’s parents and ancestors were alive then and were impacted by the events. They may or may not have shared their stories.
“It happened. It’s important that we remember history so that we don’t repeat those things in the future,” Scott said.
This tree, she said, is our reminder.
The Peace Tree Project grew from the efforts of Ashland resident Hideko Tamura Snider. Tamura Snider was born in Japan before the war. She remembers that sunny day in 1945. The day prior her mother had brought her home from an evacuation area in the hills, because she was sick. The next morning, a sunny morning, the 10-year-old’s world changed. She lost her mother in the bombing. Tamura Snider eventually moved to the United States, settling in Oregon.
In 2007, she founded One Sunny Day Initiatives to work toward nuclear non-proliferation through education. Today, the organization also has a mission to plant seeds of universal peace, hope and reconciliation, supported through a partnership with Green Legacy Hiroshima, which provided the tree seeds, according to One Sunny Day’s Estelle Voeller, who attended the dedication.
Foundation Creates Study Abroad Scholarship
As part of the Peace Tree Project at the college, SWOCC Foundation has established a one-time scholarship fund to support study aboard opportunities for local college students.
“It is through international travel, trade and exchange that we make human connections,” Thompson said announcing the scholarships. “It’s how we develop an understanding of people across our globe, forming friendships and creating the way for peace.”
SWOCC Foundation began in 1962 to support students with scholarships. Over the years, it expanded its fundraising mission to include “friend-raising” to improve people’s lives socially, culturally, economically and educationally.
College instructor Cheryl Davies echoed Thompson’s thoughts. She joined in the tree ceremony is a long-time supporter and advocate for students studying abroad. She had the opportunity when she was younger and it gave her new perspectives into the lives of others.
“Many of the ways people lived were similar to mine and yet there would always be something I had never seen or done before. I also learned to think in a foreign language,” she said. “The experience left me with wanting to use my new-found language skills and travel to other countries. It really helps to make us ‘citizens of the world’.”
To learn more about the Oregon’s Hiroshima Peace Trees, click here.
To learn more about the Southwestern Oregon Community College Foundation, click here.
