{"id":7378,"date":"2024-05-27T16:16:50","date_gmt":"2024-05-27T19:16:50","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.qccrfm.com\/news\/?p=7378"},"modified":"2024-05-27T16:16:50","modified_gmt":"2024-05-27T19:16:50","slug":"lrhs-scholarship-auction-makes-huge-impact-gears-up-for-live-event-may-30","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.qccrfm.com\/news\/2024\/05\/27\/lrhs-scholarship-auction-makes-huge-impact-gears-up-for-live-event-may-30\/","title":{"rendered":"LRHS scholarship auction makes huge impact, gears up for live event May 30"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Ava Smith and Koen Shand are Grade 12 students at Liverpool Regional High School. They’re helping out with the LRHS Scholarship Auction 2024. (Rick Conrad)<\/p><\/div>\n

The graduating class at Liverpool Regional High School may be relatively small, but they\u2019ve had a mighty significant impact over the years on students going on to higher learning.<\/span><\/p>\n

Since 1998, the Liverpool Regional High School Scholarship Auction has awarded more than 400 Queens County students over $500,000 in bursaries to help them pay for their post-secondary education.<\/span><\/p>\n

The 26th annual auction kicked off on Facebook<\/a> on April 18. And this year, for the first time since before the pandemic, the fundraiser wraps up with an in-person silent and live auction event<\/a> on Thurs., May 30 at the high school.<\/span><\/p>\n

Koen Shand and Ava Smith are two Grade 12 students who are part of the 40-person-strong organizing committee. About 25 of those volunteers are students themselves, which is about half of the graduating class. Parents, teachers and other community members make up the rest of the organizing committee.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s pretty impactful,” Koen says of the auction. “<\/span>It\u2019s just nice to know that we are such a small town and we do have that support that you might not get from coming from a big city. It\u2019s just nice to know that we have these organizaitons backing us up.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cI think it\u2019s nice to feel you have a lot of people in your corner,” Ava says, \u00a0“you have a lot of people rooting for you. It\u2019s nice to know that you have a big community, a big family here that\u2019s wanting you do well and is going to be there when you need help.”<\/span><\/p>\n

Koen will be going to Dalhousie University next year to study engineering, while Ava plans to attend Saint Mary\u2019s University and then on to Mount Saint Vincent University for an education degree.<\/span><\/p>\n

They said they were eager to help out with the auction because pursuing an education is so expensive. They\u2019re both involved with various extra-curricular activities at the school \u2014 Koen with the Key Club and various sports teams, and Ava as Nova Scotia International Student Program ambassador and as co-president of the student council.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cThis is up my alley, I love helping out with this stuff,\u201d Ava says. \u201cI just think it\u2019s good to get involved and help give back to the community that’s always helped, especially here since it\u2019s such a small community, it\u2019s such a supportive one.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cMy school has given me lots of opportunities, lot of memories, playing sports, doing multiple things,” Koen says, \u00a0“and I just think whatever I can do to give back and help our grads succeed.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Organizers expect to get more than 200 items, in addition to monetary contributions, donated from local businesses and residents for the online and in-person auctions. They\u2019ve already auctioned off dozens of items.<\/span><\/p>\n

The last time an in-person auction was held, it raised about $20,000. Since it went online, it has raised between $25,000 and $40,000 each year.<\/span><\/p>\n

Students are awarded bursaries based on need and their contribution to school life. In previous years, about a third of the class received the awards, which ranged from $500 to $2,000.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s not based on your academics,\u201d Ava says. \u201cIt\u2019s based on what you\u2019ve done to contribute to the school and in the community. Which I think is really good because there are lots of kids in our school who might not have honour rolls but are still an active member in our community and an active member in our school. Which I think is great that they are getting money they deserve.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cI think receiving money like this helps to kind of take the weight off a little bit. It\u2019s still going to cover some of your classes, your books, maybe it\u2019s going to cover your meal card, and even though it is obviously not $25,000 to cover your year, anything that contributes helps a lot. It also lessens the amount of student loan you\u2019re going to have to take out.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Ava and Koen are excited to participate in Thursday\u2019s in-person event. Students will be helping to display the items up for auction, with Al Steele as the auctioneer.<\/span><\/p>\n

When asked how much people should bid at the event, Koen has some simple advice.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cAs much as they want. It\u2019s going to a good cause, so feel free.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

The online portion of the auction is in its last week. You can participate by joining the LRHS Scholarship Auction 2024 public Facebook group<\/a>.<\/span><\/p>\n

Email: rickconradqccr@gmail.com<\/a><\/p>\n

Listen to the audio version of this story below<\/p>\nhttps:\/\/www.qccrfm.com\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/05\/lrhsfundraiserstorymay2424.mp3<\/a><\/audio>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The graduating class at Liverpool Regional High School may be relatively small, but they\u2019ve had a mighty significant impact over the years on students going on to higher learning. Since 1998, the Liverpool Regional High School Scholarship Auction has awarded more than 400 Queens County students over $500,000 in bursaries to help them pay for […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":7,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[13,5],"tags":[2249,2250,2246,2244,138,2248,2247,118,264,2241,680,2221,2242,2245,2243],"class_list":["post-7378","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-community-news","category-news-posts","tag-al-steele","tag-auction","tag-ava-smith","tag-college","tag-education","tag-graduating-class","tag-koen-shand","tag-liverpool-regional-high-school","tag-lrhs","tag-lrhs-scholarship-auction-2024","tag-lrhs-scholarship-fund","tag-post-secondary-education","tag-scholarships","tag-students","tag-university"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.qccrfm.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7378","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.qccrfm.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.qccrfm.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.qccrfm.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/7"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.qccrfm.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=7378"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.qccrfm.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7378\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":7381,"href":"https:\/\/www.qccrfm.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7378\/revisions\/7381"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.qccrfm.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7378"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.qccrfm.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=7378"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.qccrfm.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=7378"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}