Local nonprofit awards young women scholarships

Distinguished Young Women of Delaware is a nonprofit organization that provides scholarships and personal growth opportunities to young women hoping to attend college. 

The organization, led by three co-chairs, Aimee Parker Mumford, Lana Parker and Cassidy Seabolt VanPelt, offers a four-day program where females in their junior year of high school learn valuable life skills and leadership attributes. “One of our primary goals is for them to gain life skills and to get them involved in the community,” Parker Mumford said. 

Each day of the program is spent on different activities that will be performed and closely examined by judges on the final day. The girls partake in community service, heavy-duty workout routines, valuable life skills courses such as interviewing, self-defense, self-awareness and banking, as well as a final, which is a 10-minute speech to be given on stage at the conclusion of the event.  

The program features five primary categories that are judged by those who have backgrounds in each specific category. The categories are scholastic, interview, fitness, self-expression and talent. “This program is not a pageant, but there is pageantry,” Parker Mumford said.

The winner of each of these categories receives a scholarship, as well as the sole winner who will advance to the national program in Mobile, Ala., where over $100,000 in scholarships will be awarded. 

The program, which will be held at the Possum Point theater in Georgetown, will take place in August for the class of 2020. Female juniors from any high school in Delaware can compete. Interested juniors should submit their application no later than April 1.

For more information go to De.distinguishedyw.org or email Delaware@DistinguishedYW.org.