Class of 1956 is ‘Paying it Forward’

Dear Editor,

I want to share some good news at this time of stress and high emotion in our lives.

The Class of 1965 of Owego Free Academy is currently working at making their Scholarship fund a continuing gift with donations going to a “Pay It Forward” Scholarship Fund.

Last year, at our 50th class reunion, we asked for donations and had an auction to bring in money to give some scholarships to deserving students of OFA. We were able to contribute four $500 scholarship awards to four very deserving students.

It was such a great feeling that we went back to the class to ask if any were willing to make even small donations each year to keep our scholarships going.  We felt that if everyone would just give $5 a year, we could do so much with it.

We have done one scholarship in memory of a classmate who died in the Viet Nam war and one in memory of one of our class advisors who passed at a young age. We got a great response from some of the classmates and already we know that we will be able to offer scholarships to OFA students again this year.

We are thrilled with the response and the generosity of our classmates and want to publicly say that we are proud that the Class of 1965 believes in paying it forward and helping others out as they strive to start out on life’s journey just as we did 51 years ago.

They believe in higher education in many fields and they put their money where their heart is. Thank you to all who made it possible to continue the gifts and may I say, “Good Going!”

Sincerely,

Diane Szlucha

Owego, N.Y.