UNP ANNOUNCES PATHFINDER SCHOLARSHIP

FOR WEST SALT LAKE RESIDENTS

     UNP founding director Irene Fisher has announced the creation of the UNP Pathfinder Scholarship Fund, which is slated to provide tuition and fee assistance to west Salt Lake youth and adults pursuing pre-college exposure to higher education through classes, field trips, institutes and other educational programs beginning in 2008 this month at UNP’s 5th Anniversary Dinner banquet.

Because one of UNP’s major goals is to support youth from west Salt Lake neighborhoods to view higher education as an option for their own lives, the Pathfinder Scholarship has been created to enable pre-college youth—sometimes as young as kindergarteners—to engage in on-campus activities, explained Fisher.

     “I envision children from Parkview, from Mountain View, from Riley, from Northwest and other schools graduating from college and returning to these neighborhoods as engineers, as pharmacists, as teachers, as parents and as citizens to enrich the neighborhoods and broader community for all of us,” Fisher said.

     “I remember hearing an early UNP pathfinder comment that west Salt Lake neighborhoods will define the future of our shared community, because of the diversity of families, the energy of newcomers, the varied cultural perspectives,” she added, highlighting the significance of the scholarship name. For Fisher, the most important accomplishment since that early vision five years ago “has been growing roots and building collaborative partnerships in west Salt Lake neighborhoods. Strong working networks and genuine friendships have been built, marking UNP as a vital cog in sustaining the links necessary for that promise to be fulfilled and securing a foundation to move forward toward that goal.”

      Pathfinder Scholarships will support youth who live in west Salt Lake neighborhoods to attend youth classes and programs on the University of Utah campus and at other institutions of higher education. Those experiences provide increased opportunity and access to higher            

education, and enabling youth to find educational paths that will support their future and develop  

a college-going culture.  

     Fisher was appointed as a Special Assistant to the President for Campus-Community Partnerships in 2001 and was asked to help define and implement a program that would include community representatives in all phase of the planning and final program implementation. Following a year of meeting with community leaders and families within the west side community, University Neighborhood Partners was launched.  The program places the highest priority on needs-assessment by west side community members, allowing those self-identified issues to shape each collaboration.  The program continues to change and evolve as new opportunities and needs are identified.

     Under current U of U President Michael K. Young, UNP remains one of the University’s top priority programs.  Dr. Rosemarie Hunter, social work,  entered the position of Director of UNP on July 1, 2006.

     Donations to the Pathfinder Scholarship Fund can be made by clicking on the "Donors & Donations" link from this page, where users will be redirected to the University of Utah development site. Donations can be made directly to UNP and then earmarked for the Pathfinder Scholarship Fund.