DOWNEY – Jezabel Perez led a cavalcade of high school intellectual stars on the evening of May 5, as the Downey Kiwanis Foundation awarded over $112,000 in college scholarships to high school students from Downey and Lakewood in front of a packed house at the Downey Embassy Suites banquet room.

Perez, a Downey High graduate, garnered the Downey Kiwanis Foundation Youth Services Award and the Bennie C. and Ann Reagan Memorial Scholarship for a total of $16,000.

Two other Downey High grads, Fiorella Garcia and Litzy Plata, were multiple winners. Garcia won the Downey Kiwanis Foundation Youth Service Award and the Downey Kiwanis Foundation Citizenship Award, while Plata took home the Lehman Family Scholarship and the Don and Carmen Ondrusek Cuevas Vasquez Family Scholarship.

The biggest total prize of the evening was the Everett Family Memorial Scholarship, a $50,000 grant that was divided between Nina Cooper, Alyssa De La Cerda, Emily Falcon, and Pedro Loza. Vianni Richards and Perez divided the $30,000 Reagan Scholarship.

In all, over $112,125 was awarded to 37 awardees from Columbus High, Downey High, Warren High, and Lakewood high schools.

Billed as “Downey Kiwanis’s Finest Hour,” the event personified the mission of the Downey Kiwanis Foundation to improve the lives of youth everywhere, one person and one community at a time.

The banquet, attended by the awardees, their parents, teachers, and administrators, is the signature event of Downey Noon Kiwanis.

“This is to honor the brightest and the best and give each one of them a better chance in college,” remarked Kiwanis President Stephen Chu, himself a former president of the Downey High School Key Club. “We at Downey Noon Kiwanis are very proud of them and wish them the best.”

Scholarship applicants were interviewed by several committees comprised of the members of Downey Noon Kiwanis. Each scholarship has its own criteria. The banquet was a major undertaking. “Each member of Downey Kiwanis worked as a team to pull this together,” explained Downey Kiwanis Foundation Scholarship Chair, Carmen Vasquez Ondrusek, who also chaired the event. “This banquet is the heartbeat of Kiwanis. I could not have been more proud of our club.”

In addition to the student scholarships, the Downey Kiwanis Foundation awarded three cash awards of $2,000 each to teachers of the year of the three Downey high schools: Smith Prasirtpun (Columbus), Lonnie Shelton (Downey), and Frank Menjivar (Warren).

“This is a super way to end the school year,” commented Chu. “We will be back next year as well. Kiwanis cannot wait to help.”