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Clear skies. Low near 40F. Winds light and variable..
Clear skies. Low near 40F. Winds light and variable.
Updated: February 26, 2025 @ 5:29 pm
Summerville High School Foundation board members (clockwise from top facing right) chairwoman Betsy Hurst, Sandra Asquith, Patt Koral, Jimmie Nixon, SHS District Superintendent Michael Merrill, SHS Career Counselor Jame Dahl, Wayne deGennaro Stephene Tune, SHSF Executive Director Jan Hiebert, and Erika Simonson sign the Sonora Area Foundation’s Career Technical Education pledge at a meeting Monday night.
Betsy Hurst, chairwoman of the Summerville High School Foundation board, hands the Frank Barron Cota Endowment fund check to Sonora Area Foundation CEO Darrell Slocum for deposit to the Frank Barron Cota Memorial Scholarship Fund at the Sonora Area Foundation.
The Summerville High School Foundation board and school staff celebrate the large endowment from alumnus Frank Barron Cota, including (back row, from left) Wayne deGennaro, Jimmie Nixon, Michael Merrill, Darrell Slocum, Betsy Hurst, Ericka Simonson, Sandra Asquith, and (front row, from left) Jan Hiebert, Stephene Tune, Jamee Dahl, and Patt Koral.
Summerville High School Foundation board members (clockwise from top facing right) chairwoman Betsy Hurst, Sandra Asquith, Patt Koral, Jimmie Nixon, SHS District Superintendent Michael Merrill, SHS Career Counselor Jame Dahl, Wayne deGennaro Stephene Tune, SHSF Executive Director Jan Hiebert, and Erika Simonson sign the Sonora Area Foundation’s Career Technical Education pledge at a meeting Monday night.
Betsy Hurst, chairwoman of the Summerville High School Foundation board, hands the Frank Barron Cota Endowment fund check to Sonora Area Foundation CEO Darrell Slocum for deposit to the Frank Barron Cota Memorial Scholarship Fund at the Sonora Area Foundation.
The Summerville High School Foundation board and school staff celebrate the large endowment from alumnus Frank Barron Cota, including (back row, from left) Wayne deGennaro, Jimmie Nixon, Michael Merrill, Darrell Slocum, Betsy Hurst, Ericka Simonson, Sandra Asquith, and (front row, from left) Jan Hiebert, Stephene Tune, Jamee Dahl, and Patt Koral.
A recent endowment of nearly $160,000 will provide scholarships for Summerville High School students looking to enroll in an apprenticeship program or take up a trade after they graduate.
The money comes from Summerville High alumnus Frank Barron Cota, who died in July 2023 and graduated from the school with the Class of 1945.
Cota had approached the Summerville High School Foundation in 2010 about donating the proceeds from the sale of his home upon his death.
Mick Grimes, the former executive director for the Sonora Area Foundation, was a member of the foundation’s board at the time and worked with Cota to reach out to an attorney and create his trust.
After Cota’s home was sold in April 2024, the foundation recently received a check for $157,246.04 specified in the trust to be used to set up a memorial scholarship in his name.
“The board members of the SHS Foundation and I are very grateful for this gift,” Jan Hiebert, executive director of the foundation, said.
Cota enlisted in the U.S. Army after graduating from Summerville High and was stationed in Japan before returning home and going to work at the Standard Mill. He worked his way up over the years to become a union negotiator and eventually moved to Modesto.
Hiebert said the scholarship in Cota’s name is intended to honor him and his lifelong profession, and falls in line with the Sonora Area Foundation’s new initiative focused on promoting career technical education, or CTE.
Part of the goal of the Sonora Area Foundation’s CTE initiative is to enlighten and educate young people and their parents about education options in the county.
At a meeting Monday night, the Summerville High School Foundation board signed the CTE Pledge that the Sonora Area Foundation has been circulating for organizations and businesses in the county to show their support for CTE.
Sonora Area Foundation CEO Darrell Slocum, Summerville Unified High School District Superintendent Michael Merrill and the district’s newly appointed career counselor Jamee Dahl attended the meeting Monday to show their support, as well.
“Our combined goal is that every graduate at Summerville will be prepared to meet the demands of the workforce in our world today,” Hiebert said.
The first Frank B. Cota Memorial Scholarship is slated to be awarded in May at the Summerville Scholarship Awards Night.
Anyone who knows a Summerville High senior who fits the CTE profile is encouraged to contact Dahl at (209) 928-4228, ext. 6221.
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