Three deserving students from the John Jay Campus High Schools (237 7th Avenue) will have an extra $1,000 to pay for college thanks to grants awarded by the Park Slope Civic Council.
Patrice Bailey was awarded the Rosemarie and Francis J. Kazeroid Scholarship, named after a pair of community activists who founded the scholarship and continued to endow it.
Rasheed Rankine and Shantayle Roseboro received the Mary Laverne Allman Scholarships, named after the late wife of Civic Council trustee Nathaniel Allman.
Candidates were selected by a five-person committee chaired by Joan Emerson, a member of the Civic Council. Selections were based on the students’ commitment to volunteer work and improving their communities.
Bailey, a Flatbush resident and student at the Secondary School for Journalism, volunteered at Sesame Flyers International (3510 Church Avenue), a youth services organization catered to the largely Caribbean community it serves.
As one of the organization’s youth leaders, Bailey takes her role as a mentor seriously.
“A lot of people don’t respond well if they think you’re telling them what to do. I want to let them know that it’s a choice to be here. It’s important that you approach people that way,” she said.
In addition, Bailey, who is of Jamaican descent, teaches the steel pan, a uniquely Carribean instrument, to young children in the program.
According to Amy Seponara, one of Bailey’s teachers at the Secondary School for Journalism, “She’s intelligent and compassionate. She’s a doer – a very proactive person.”
Next year, Bailey will attend SUNY-Oneonta. She plans to study communications and hopes become a producer.
“But if I build up the courage to speak out more, maybe even a TV show host,” she said.
Rankine is an East Flatbush resident who volunteered as a tutor for Project Reach Youth (199 14th Street; 456 Fifth Avenue), a community-based organization serving the area’s low-income youth.
A student at the Secondary School for Law, Rankine spent most of his time tutoring middle school students, guiding them through those transitional, make-or-break academic years.
He got his informal start tutoring by helping his younger sister with her math homework. After spending the bulk of his senior year volunteering, the Skidmore College-bound Rankine wants to be a teacher.
“I want to be a teacher in the city – it’s a good feeling being able to help people learn new things,” he said.
Susana Voigt, a teacher at the Secondary School for Law, described Rankine as “very serious about his craft. He is passionate about his interests.”
Roseboro, a Park Slope resident and student at the Secondary School for Research, volunteered at New York Methodist Hospital (506 6th Street) this past year.
Roseboro wants to be an OB/GYN, and her experience at New York Methodist proved invaluable training. She assisted physicians in both the Labor and Delivery and Medical Surgical units.
“I was scared I would do something wrong at first, but it helped reinforce that I wanted to become a physician,” she said.
Roseboro has always been a science buff: as a little girl, she collected worms from Prospect Park.
This summer, she is bound for the Williams College Summer Science program in preparation for classes at Williams this fall.
Josh Steckel, Roseboro’s teacher at the Secondary School for Research, glowingly described her as “an outstanding student and an extraordinary activist.”
Before this year, the three scholarships were for only $500. But the Civic Council kicked in its own funds to increase that amount to $1,000 to better reflect the rising cost of college.
“We thought it needed to be $1,000 to make it a meaningful amount,” Civic Council President Ken Freeman said.
