SUPREMELY WELL-DONE SCHOLARSHIPS!
Our Scholarship Committee, headed by the exceptionally capable and dedicated Annmarie Zilnicki, presented life-changing gifts to Riverhead students this year. Flanked by Riverhead Rotary President Randy Morreale on the left and Immediate Past President George Dupree on the right, with AnnMarie in the middle, eight of the bright and talented recipients are shown here along with Brian Stark whose generous donations did much to augment the blessings.
Here's how the Riverhead News-Review reported it:
The Rotary Club of Riverhead awarded a total of $105,500 in college scholarships to 15 students at their annual Scholarship Luncheon Wednesday, July 9, at the Hyatt’s Sea Star Ballroom. Annmarie Zilnicki, chair of the group’s scholarship committee, opened and closed the awards and introduced the recipients.
The winning students were selected from a pool of 42 applicants. The two Riverhead Rotary Scholarship award amounts increased from $4,000 to $8,000 this year. One recipient, Stephanie Cardona, received two awards — the Rotary scholarship and the INTERACT scholarship.
“Look at the courses that these kids are taking, the activities that they’re involved with, the internships they might do. It’s just amazing, and I don’t know how they can get it all done and still play sports or be in the orchestra or whatever it might be,” said Ms. Zilnicki in her opening remarks. “It’s very, very impressive. My hat’s off to all of you.”
The largest award category was the three W. Bruce Stark Memorial Scholarship at $25,000 each. Brian Stark, the son of a long-time Rotarian and a former member of the rotary himself, praised the recipients’ dedication to service.
“It’s always nice to see kids like this, who get it. They all have the grades, they all play sports, but when they write the essays, they show that they’ve bought into doing the extra stuff,” said Mr. Stark. “It’s easy to get caught up in our social media corridors, right? Everybody goes online and they listen to a lot of people like themselves. But these kids get it that you have to go out into the community and do things.”
He went on to challenge the students to continue their good works of service.
“Get out there and give back, because that’s what we all do here, and that’s very important. So, thank you for being good scholarship winners and keep giving back,” Mr. Stark said.
“I am very proud of the work Riverhead Rotary does with our scholarship program as well as all of the programs Rotary funds throughout the year in our Riverhead community,” said Ms. Zilnicki in a follow-up email. “Our long-term hope for this year’s scholarship winners is for them to return to Riverhead during their careers and one day become Rotarians themselves.”
The scholarship awardees were Lorena Correa, Annabelle Dunn, Adrianna Mosca, Jaidin Hansen, Stephanie Cardona, Sara Maas, Gianna Viola, Renata De Paz Abreu, Logan Pilon, Camden Wallace, Dean Redmond, Alice Ries, Hunter Thompson, and Kimoralynn Bland. Each recipient gave a short speech detailing their future plans.
Since 2013, the Rotary has given $705,000 in scholarship funds.
[Amanda Olsen, 07.10.2025 NEWS]
[Amanda Olsen, 07.10.2025 NEWS]
Congratulations one and all!