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Columbus, October 2009

CLEVELAND RESIDENT, RECIPIENT OF PHILIP S. WILLIS ENDOWED SCHOLARSHIP, PURSUING DEGREE AT DEFIANCE COLLEGE

Rebecca Zebrowski, from Cleveland, Ohio is a junior at Defiance College majoring in International and Global Studies.  She is the recipient of a scholarship from the Philip S. Willis Endowed Scholarship Fund through The Ohio Foundation of Independent Colleges’ (OFIC) Ohio Scholars Program. 
Rebecca chose Defiance College specifically to study at the college’s McMaster School for Advancing Humanity, a service learning program that allows students to explore concepts learned in the classroom in an international setting.   Involvement in the program allows her to combine her love of travel with her sense of service to humanitarian responsibility.    During her sophomore year, Rebecca spent a month in Cambodia studying and working on her McMaster project, which focuses on the study of traditional indigenous medicine.   She will travel to Cambodia again this year to report on her findings, continue researching traditional healthcare methods and provide Defiance healthcare partners in the area with training in safe ways to apply them.  

On campus Rebecca continues her service to humanity serving as student coordinator for the Hench Autism Studies Program, which helps autistic teens adjust to social environments more easily using college students as models for practice sessions.   

Profoundly grateful for the financial assistance she has received, Rebecca says that the value of her scholarship gift is impossible to describe.  “It has enabled me,” she wrote to her donor, “to attend college and help the Cambodians gain access to ancient and effective remedies that had been lost.   I have had the opportunity to work with the teens involved in the Hench Program and help train the college students that serve as models.  It has all been a wonderful learning experience for me.  None of this would have been possible without your generosity.”  

OFIC is the primary corporate and foundation solicitation organization for 34 independent Ohio colleges and universities and operates one of the largest, most comprehensive and diverse scholarship management services in the state.  OFIC member colleges collectively enroll 98,000 students and award one-third of all bachelor’s degrees in the state. For 60 years OFIC has worked to highlight the leadership, value and excellence of independent higher education and has provided unrestricted operating funds and scholarship commitments through funds raised in annual solicitations of businesses and foundations, thereby assuring continuation of excellence in private higher education. OFIC is governed by a Board of Trustees comprised of Ohio’s corporate leaders, as well as presidents of the 34 member colleges.

The member colleges are:  Ashland University, Baldwin-Wallace College, Bluffton University, Capital University, Cedarville University, University of Dayton, Defiance College, Denison University, The University of Findlay, Franciscan University of Steubenville, Franklin University, Heidelberg University, Hiram College, John Carroll University, Kenyon College, Lake Erie College, Lourdes College, Malone University, Marietta College, Mount Union College, Mount Vernon Nazarene University, Muskingum University, Notre Dame College, Oberlin College, Ohio Dominican University, Ohio Northern University, Ohio Wesleyan University, Otterbein College, Urbana University, Ursuline College, Walsh University, Wilmington College, Wittenberg University and The College of Wooster.