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After a rigorous application process, including an interview with the scholarship committee and a demonstration of outstanding achievements, Dev Patel has been named as the 40th Owen County recipient of the Lilly Endowment Community Scholarship.
Dev is a senior at Owen Valley High School and is the son of Mahesh and Hansa Patel, of Spencer. Dev served as the student body treasurer of Owen Valley High School’s class of 2022 from his freshman through junior year. Currently, he is active in Beta Club and Academic Super Bowl, and he was able to participate in a Science and Engineering Apprenticeship at the Naval Surface Warfare Center in Crane, IN. Although he has not yet decided on which college to attend, Dev plans to pursue a degree in business and engineering. Dev ranks first in his class and his recommendations say that he is a natural leader and a gentleman.
The Owen County Community Foundation has awarded this full-tuition, four-year scholarship to honor the student of the county who has demonstrated the highest achievements in academics, service to their high school, involvement in the community, leadership, and recognition through honors and awards earned while in high school.
In Owen County, the Lilly Endowment Community Scholarship honors an Owen County student who has demonstrated the highest achievements in academics, service to their high school, involvement in the community, leadership, and recognition through honors and awards earned while in high school. The Lilly Endowment Community Scholarship provides for full tuition, required fees and a special allocation of up to $900 per year for required books and required equipment for four years of undergraduate study on a full-time basis leading to a baccalaureate degree at any eligible Indiana public or private nonprofit college or university.
This year, there were eight Owen County students chosen as finalists to compete for the Lilly Endowment Community Scholarship.
“The Lilly Endowment Community Scholarship is the highest academic scholarship available locally to Owen County students through the Foundation,” said Janet Rummel, President & CEO of the Owen County Community Foundation. “All of our candidates and especially the finalists had amazing careers in high school, but after some tough competition, Dev’s accomplishments led the way.”
Using criteria developed by OCCF’s board of directors and approved by Independent Colleges of Indiana (ICI), the scholarship committee evaluates applications and interviews the finalists. The committee then recommends the top finalists to the OCCF board. With endorsement by OCCF’s board, nominations are then forwarded to ICI for the final selection of Owen County’s class of 2022 recipient of the Lilly Endowment Community Scholarship. Lilly Endowment Community Scholars are known for their community involvement, academic achievement, character and leadership.
ICI is a nonprofit corporation that represents 30 regionally accredited degree-granting, nonprofit, private colleges, and universities in Indiana. Indiana ranks among the lowest states in the percentage of residents over the age of 25 who have earned bachelor’s degrees. The Lilly Endowment Community Scholarship Program is a statewide initiative of the Lilly Endowment Inc. to help raise the level of educational attainment in Indiana and to increase awareness of the beneficial roles Indiana community foundation can play in their communities. The Lilly Endowment Community Scholarship Program encourages and supports the efforts of past and present Lilly Endowment Scholars to engage with each other and with Indiana business, government, educational, nonprofit, and civic leaders to improve the quality of life in Indiana generally and in local communities throughout the state.
Lilly Endowment created the Lilly Endowment Community Scholarship Program for the 1998-1999 school year and has supported the program every year since with tuition grants totaling in excess of $439 million. More than 5,000 Indiana students have received the Lilly Endowment Community Scholarship since the program’s inception.