Cajun flair to hit college campuses

Caps fly through the air, tassels move from one side to the other, and “Pomp and Circumstance March” is played loudly through auditorium speakers.

It’s graduation time again, and many of the Tri-parish area’s best and brightest are preparing to take their academic talents to college campuses around the state and possibly around the nation.

But with increasing tuition costs, private scholarships and TOPS grants have become even more important for students to be able to continue their education.

For that reason, South Terrebonne Professional School Counselor Christina Falgout said private scholarship providers looked to offer a different demographic of students money in 2010.

“I saw an increase in people giving out private scholarships considering student need and student extra curricular activity a little bit more than they have in the past,” she said. “Looking at our scholarship winners, a lot more of the students were students that had financial need and had extra curricular activities.”

South Terrebonne graduating seniors received $636,120 in private scholarships as well as $633,600 from TOPS.

The high school was one of many in the Tri-parish area to have higher scholarship totals this year than in years past.

“Our students in more of a financially-deprived situation also met the academic and ACT requirements, and that seemed to be where the increase was,” said Falgout. “Whereas in years past, I don’t know if I had as many students who met that low financial status and met the qualifications.”

Elsewhere in the Tri-parish area, South Lafourche High School earned more than $2.6 million in combined private and TOPS scholarships – a number that is almost double from last year’s total, according to Senior Counselor Joy Pierce.

“When students met with me, I encouraged them to apply to more than one school so that they would be able to have options – being able to take the best offer,” said Pierce. “Plus, we had some very sharp kids with high ACT scores this year.”

As for private schools in the Tri-parish area, a more wealthy demographic could cause students to become lazy and lose the incentive to go after scholarships, but that’s definitely not the case at Vandebilt and E.D. White.

“Our students are very aggressive in seeking scholarships,” said E.D. White Senior Counselor Kris Guillot. “Last year’s class had 72 percent of the class earn the TOPS Scout Scholarship.”

With 96 percent of E.D. White grads looking to go to a 4-year university, 2010 grads received more than $3.175 million in scholarships without even including TOPS – up from $2.375 million last year.

“So because they’re so college driven, they’re looking for the scholarship money,” said Guillot.

Vandebilt grads earned a total of $8.6 million for athletic and academic scholarships combined, averaging $45,000 per graduate.

“It was significantly higher this year than last, because we had a very large graduating class. We had 189 graduates. Last year, we had 149,” said Lisa Vegas, Vandebilt director of advancement and public relations. “We have a large number of our students, about 70 percent or so each year receive TOPS.”