Mount Pleasant student wins scholarship for outstanding community service project – WCIV
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by ABC NEWS 4 STAFF
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MOUNT PLEASANT, S.C. (WCIV) — Yiqing Ye of Mount Pleasant has been awarded the 2025 R.D. Bennett Community Service Scholarship from The Electric Cooperatives of South Carolina, the trade association for the state’s independent, not-for-profit electric cooperatives.
The $5,000 college scholarship is given to a South Carolina high school student whose community service project best reflects the cooperative principle of “concern for community.”
Ye, 17, was selected from a group of high school students statewide who completed projects this summer. His project, “Fundraising and volunteer initiative for Landmarks For Families,” raised more than $2,300 for the organization, which was founded in 1790 as the Charleston Orphan House — the first publicly funded orphanage in the United States.
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Landmarks For Families serves more than 800 children and families each year by providing shelter for at-risk youth, education for parents and services to reunite and strengthen families.
“The most rewarding part of being a leader was witnessing the change we created firsthand,” Ye said. “Seeing how our work directly supported family programs while also showing others the power of youth-led initiatives made the experience especially meaningful.”
“Yiqing clearly put a lot of time and effort into his project,” one of the judges said. “I commend him on the continuous involvement he had with Landmark—on top of his other commitments.”
Ye completed his project after attending the electric cooperatives’ annual Washington Youth Tour, which sends rising high school seniors to Washington, D.C., each summer. He was one of 10 students selected by Berkeley Electric Cooperative to join 71 students from across the state on the trip.
Ye is a senior at Academic Magnet High School in North Charleston. He and his brother, Yidong, discussed their experiences with the youth programs on a recent Berkeley Electric podcast.
