By Christine Cabrales

At the end of Spring semester, Arizona Western College maintained its 7-year tradition of hosting the Student Showcase on campus, this time in the Schoening Conference Center. What was new this year was $5,000 in prize money, donated by the Gowan Company, for the best student projects in four General Education categories.

On April 29, the General Education Curriculum Committee (GECC) hosted this annual event to give students a chance to display the projects they have been working on during the year. The event featured a wide variety of works that students have created, including musical or dramatic performances, brochures, science-related presentations and creative writing.

The Gowan Company provided its generous donation to the GECC to distribute to students as five separate $1000 scholarships in the categories of Digital Literacy, Quantitative Analysis, Scientific Literacy, Communication and Civic Discourse. However, no entries were made for Quantitative Analysis, so one of the scholarships was split in half for second place winners.

Among the many talented participants, the winners are Emily Hughes, 1st place in Civic Discourse; Shelby Turner, 1st place in Digital Literacy; Jose Alejandro Martinez, 1st place in Scientific Literacy; Amber Meade, 1st place in Communications; Rio Jauregui, 2nd place in Civic Discourse; and Jaime Sanchez de la Vega, 2nd place in Communications.

"I was absolutely shocked that I won the scholarship," Hughes said. "I plan on putting the money towards paying for textbooks at Central Michigan University, where I will be attending school in the Fall."

Overall the Student Showcase was a huge success, with many students and staff crowding around the participants to hear their presentations. In the future, the GECC hopes to have more money towards scholarships for their participants.

Photo by AWC Photo Services