For Immediate Release
Thursday, May 31, 2007
AFSCME Member, Nine Family Members Win Prestigious Union Plus Scholarships
$150,000 Awarded to 103 Students Representing 45 Unions
WASHINGTON, DC —One AFSCME member and nine AFSCME family members have been selected as winners of the 2007 Union Plus Scholarship awards.
The AFSCME winners are Sarah Brown of Fairbanks, AK ($4,000), whose father is a member of Local 52; George A. Campbell of Elkridge, MD ($1,000), who is a member of Local 3644; Jonathan K. Cardinal of Ogdensburg, NY ($2,000), whose father is a member of Local 423; Daniel J. Cook of Knox, NY ($1,000), whose mother is a member of Local 801; Sarah Isaacs-Mayers of Loleta, CA ($500), whose mother is a member of Local 684; Shelby Jordan of Columbus, OH ($1,000), whose father is a member of Local 1632; Emerald P. Katz of Soledad, CA ($1,000), whose father is a member of Local 2620; Anthony R. Leslie of Trout Lake, WA ($1,000), whose father is a member of Local 716; Kyle Srivastava of Hockessin, DE ($1,000), whose father is a member of Local 1607; and Danna E. Thomas of Annapolis, MD ($1,000), whose father is a member of Local 1509.
These 10 winners are among 103 students from 45 unions awarded a total of $150,000 in scholarships from the Union Plus Scholarship program. The awards are being distributed to students who are from union families, or are union members themselves, attending two-year and four-year colleges as well as recognized technical or trade schools.
Winners were chosen from more than 5,500 applications received from 58 unions in all 50 states and many territories, as well as Puerto Rico and the District of Columbia. The scholarships are sponsored by the Union Plus Education Foundation, which receives funding from HSBC, the issuer of the AFSCME Advantage Credit Card. Since 1992, more than $2.4 million has been awarded through these prestigious scholarship awards.
“This program is a way to help union members and their families realize their dreams,” says Leslie Tolf, president of Union Privilege, the AFL-CIO-founded organization that administers the scholarship program. “With the rising cost of college tuition, we’re doing everything we can to help union families save money.”
Saving Money Every Day Helps Families Afford College
Union Privilege offers an array of benefits that save money for union members and their families. These include mortgage and finance benefits, education and insurance benefits and even money-saving offers on such items as computers, health services and vacations. Union members can visit www.UnionPlus.org to find out what benefits their unions offer.
According to AFL-CIO President John Sweeney, union benefits like these are needed more than ever. Real wages are falling and college costs continue to rise up to 10 percent each year, hitting working families the hardest.
“That’s why we’re so pleased,” says Tolf, “to offer the Union Plus Scholarship program and help make college more affordable for union families. And that’s why we’re so proud of our winners, many of whom have demonstrated great dedication, creativity and hard work in pursuing their academic and career goals.”
Sarah Brown: The Next Frontier
Nothing has held Sarah Brown, daughter of AFSCME member Fred Brown, back from achieving her goals in life. Not the long distance she had to travel from her home in Fairbanks, AK, to serve an internship in Congress and deliver a speech at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier. And not the serious illness she suffered in 2001, when she required six days of emergency hospitalization and treatment.
Medical bills like those literally are bankrupting many working families. But Sarah’s father, who serves as president of his local, had the union benefit of a Health Trust to cover nearly all of Sarah’s expenses. She’s gone on to thrive academically and to serve her state and her nation through many volunteer and service projects.
Now there’s only one thing that could hold Sarah back from pursuing her degree in economics and pre-law at the University of Pennsylvania, and then continuing on to law school, and that’s the tuition. But don’t ever count Sarah out. Especially now that she’s received a $4,000 Union Plus Scholarship. “I have seen firsthand what unions can do for their members,” Sarah says. “I hope to carry on the union’s goal of providing equal access to justice for union members and all citizens.”
George Campbell: Enter, Mediator
Never doubt the power of the individual to help make the world a better place. That could be AFSCME member George Campbell’s motto, as he volunteers with young people and seniors, helps direct community cleanup programs, leads food drives and “get out the vote” campaigns, and simply makes a difference everywhere he can.
A former boss who wrote a letter of recommendation for George put it this way: “George is the kind of person that anyone could approach and ask for help.”
But while anyone can make a difference, George also understands that, sometimes, special skills are required. In his experience as a union member, he has recognized the important role that skilled arbitrators and mediators can play in resolving conflicts. That’s why he’s continuing his education to become a mediator and help advance the interests of working people. His drive to improve his life, and his commitment to help others, is, he says, “the very embodiment of a union worker.”
Jonathan Cardinal: The Art of the Possible
Growing up is the process of finding ourselves. For Jonathan Cardinal, it wasn’t always an easy search. He remembers feeling as if he didn’t fit in, and he still winces as he recalls the bullying he experienced in high school.
But in his senior year Jonathan experienced something much more positive when he was exposed, for the first time, to politics and debate. Here he finally found all the “energy, honor and possibility” he’d been looking for.
Not surprisingly, with this new inspiration Jonathan has blossomed in college. He’s helped lead fund-raising drives and traveled across the country to teach kids an anti-bullying curriculum. He’s been elected president of a political club in college. And as he’s become a leader, himself, he’s gained an even deeper understanding of why union membership is so important.
“Although my family has always been rewarded by my father’s union membership,” he says of the pay and benefits his father, Kevin J. Cardinal, earns as an AFSCME member, “I only genuinely grasped the vital importance of organized labor while working alongside local labor leaders to recruit over 100 young workers in the area to join our organization. Our newly strengthened chapter now has the clout to influence the outcomes of elections and the direction of public policy.”
Daniel Cook: Someone to Look Up To
“I work at a home for troubled children,” says Daniel Cook. “The kids I work with have behavioral, emotional or mental health issues. I am a nearly 22-year-old, white male doing parenting for kids of many races, all completely unfamiliar with a positive male role model.”
Daniel is grateful for the strong male role model his father gave him. And despite the frustrations he encounters in such a challenging job, he truly loves the important work he’s doing. Still, he wonders whether, if the center where he works were unionized, it might offer “higher wages, more comfortable working conditions and benefits”—the kind Daniel’s mother, Concetta Cook, earns in her union job—“that would draw more loyalty.”
Daniel knows greater staff loyalty would mean more stability for the kids, and that’s something they desperately need. “They need amazing amounts of understanding, patience and consistency,” he says. And they also need people like Daniel who make helping children their career goal.
Sarah Isaacs-Mayers: Connected to History
Not every child gets a second chance, but Sarah Isaacs-Mayers did. Abandoned by her birth family at age 15, during a rough period in her life, she was told her chances of being adopted were “slim” at best. But she wanted to give it a try, and she was fortunate to find a caring foster family that adopted her. “When I found my adoptive family my outlook completely turned around and I started to enjoy life again,” Sarah says. “I made friends and my grades got better.”
While working on a research paper about her own family history, Sarah learned she was related to Rosie the Riveter, the inspirational American worker from World War II. “Hearing her story,” Sarah says, “I started to realize how hard working Americans have to work for their unions and continually fight for rights.”
That’s a message Sarah’s mother, AFSCME member Randy Mayers, has only reinforced. “She has taught me the importance of a united workforce in this new age of robber barons,” Sarah says.
Shelby Jordan: Healthy and Wise
Shelby Jordan teaches younger children the importance of staying healthy and living their lives “smoke free.” After three years of working in hospital internships, she knows what a blessing good health is, and she wants to help others to achieve it. “My volunteer experiences,” she says, “have inspired me to become a physician. With this as my profession, I look forward to helping people and doing all I can to give back to the community.”
Shelby understands that her community, and our nation at large, is stronger and healthier when working people stand together. “I have learned about the spirit of workers, the importance of rights and responsibilities and the power of unity,” she says. “I am glad that in our nation, we have unions that empower hard workers.”
Of union workers like her father, AFSCME member William Jordan, Shelby says “they are a vital part of what makes the U.S.A. so great.”
Emerald Katz: A True Gem
Emerald Katz always heard that unions stand up for their members. When she started college, she discovered just how true that is. Her father, AFSCME member Ira S. Katz, became ill, and the union fought hard for his pay and benefits. “I have seen firsthand how the union takes care of its members,” she says.
But Emerald knows too many workers don’t have union representation—or even basic health care coverage. “The system is not working,” she says. That’s one reason Emerald is working so hard to complete her double major in social welfare and political science, acquiring, as she puts it, “the skills, experience and empathy to help reform our health system.”
“Health care is non-negotiable,” she adds.
Anthony Leslie: Up, Up and Away
“I learned the advantages of being a union member,” says Anthony Leslie, “when I was 12 years old. My father, William Leslie, lost the job he had held for 30 years. After hundreds of hours writing letters, making phone calls and talking to lawyers, my father was never rehired by that company. Now, as a state employee and AFSCME member, he is experiencing the benefits of belonging to a union: a good health care plan, retirement benefits and job security.”
Anthony has chosen a different career path for himself—one that will have him soaring. “Last year I obtained my pilot’s license and this year I am working toward my instrument rating. It is very exciting to be working toward a career where I will be doing something I love.”
But when it comes to pay and benefits, Anthony is keeping his feet on the ground. “After watching the struggle that my father went through,” he says, “I plan to join to join a union.”
Kyle Srivastava: Supports Medicine
Kyle Srivastava is a young man of diverse interests. He finds inspiration in the words of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. and intellectual stimulation exploring, as he puts it, “the logic behind mathematics and the complexity of physics.”
But it is with running that Kyle found his favorite hobby and career objective. He writes, “Through running I have exposed myself to an academic interest in how the human body’s joints work and move. This has brought me to a career plan in biomedical engineering, with a focus on running injuries and prosthetics.”
While Kyle’s interests have evolved, one thing in his life has remained constant, and that’s the steady paycheck and excellent benefits his father, AFSCME member Saurabh Srivastava, has brought home. “My life has been affected by unions since I was born. One of the great benefits of a union is that it provides job security to my father, who works for the county. The political environment changes every four years because of elections, and my father very well could have been laid off. But with the job security and fair wages guaranteed by the union, my father has been able to give me the opportunity to attend college.”
Danna Thomas: Glowing with Promise
Anyone who was present at the sixth grade science fair a few years ago could tell that Danna Thomas had a good head on her shoulders. While other kids presented foam models of the solar system, Danna showed a project called “Fruit Flies and Cell Phone Radiation.”
“My exploration of genomic instability in fruit flies by counting the number of fly mutations as a result of radiation exposure has progressed into the interest in radiation I have today,” says Danna, who wants to become a scientist pursuing radiation research.
Danna’s father, AFSCME member Duane L. Thomas, helped inspire her interest in science, and also her appreciation for unions. “The American Dream,” she says, “would not have been possible without the work of unions established throughout America.”
How the Union Plus Scholarship Program Works
In addition to demonstrating academic ability, applicants are required to submit essays of no more than 500 words describing their career goals, detailing their personal relationship with the union movement and explaining why they are deserving of a union scholarship.
Individuals must be accepted into an accredited college or university, community college or recognized technical or trade school at the time the award is issued. Starting with 2008, graduate school students also will be eligible for Union Plus Scholarships. There is no requirement to have participated in any AFSCME Advantage program in order to qualify.
2008 Applications
Applications for next year’s awards will be available in September 2007. To download the application at that time, visit the AFSCME.org site. Or, applicants may send a postcard with their name, return address, telephone number and international union name to: Union Plus Education Foundation, c/o Union Privilege, P.O. Box 34800, Washington, DC 20043-4800.
The application deadline is January 31, 2008. Recipients of scholarships will be announced May 31, 2008. Due to the high volume of applications, only winners will receive notification.
