CENTRAL, Texas (KTRE) – At Central High School, Senior Keyla Contreras now has a huge weight lifted off her shoulders.
“I knew it’d be really hard for my family to send me to college because I’m a first gen student,” said Contreras.
Going to college was always her goal, but even as Central High School’s 2025 Salutatorian, the cost of going to a four-year university made that possibility seem out of reach.
Until Easter Sunday, when she and her mom got an award email from the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation.
“We were both holding our breath, and then we open it and it says ‘congratulations’. It was just amazing,” said Contreras.
The Gates Scholarship pays the full cost of tuition, housing, and books to minority, low income students going to school to earn a bachelor’s degree.
The ideal candidate has an outstanding academic record, demonstrates leadership ability, and other skills like perseverance.
Contreras is only the second Central High School student to get the scholarship. The first was her cousin in 2023.
“It’s so much work on top of my schoolwork, so many essays and paragraphs to write, but my mom kept pushing me through it saying you got to do this. So, I did it and here I am,” said Contreras.
The application process took months of interviews from over 40,000 students.
Now that Contreras has been selected, her college tuition and fees don’t seem so heavy after all.
“Knowing that all four years are going to be covered is just mind blowing,” said Contreras.
Contreras says she plans to attend Texas A&M University in the Fall, to study biomedical engineering.
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