Two Bow Valley High School students have been awarded scholarships from the Clearwater Endowment Fund / SLS Recreation Park Society to the tune of $1,500.

Cochranites Avery McGuinness and Mikaela Murphy are the 2021 scholarship recipients. Spray Lake Sawmills Family Sports Centre's Program Manager, Brooke Sabourin says that they underwent an intense screening process starting with an extremely detailed application form.

"It had a variety of questions, some relating about your experience here at our facility and how sport has impacted their life," says Sabourin. "Some related to their financial constraints or how they're saving up for school and some talks more about leadership qualities."

Along with their application forms the candidates also had to submit their high school transcripts and two letters of reference.

Sabourin says that they received several outstanding applications this year but two applicants stood out amongst all deciding members of the panel.

"There were four of us on the committee and we all decided we would meet with our top four picks," says Sabourin. "We sat down and all four of us had these two on our list so it was a clear outcome that these were indeed the top two."

Sabourin says that while the COVID-19 pandemic hasn't been ideal for most circumstances, conducting a zoom meeting for these two candidates actually added to the experience.

"We said we had a few more questions for them and we would need their parents there as well on a zoom call to go over a few last-minute questions," explains Sabourin. "It was just our ruse so that we would get to experience to get to see the look on their parents' faces and how proud they were of their kids and just that shock on their face when they hear that they had already indeed won the scholarship."

Sabourin says that capturing the moment when they were told they won was a touching and special experience to be a part of.

This Fall, Mikaela Murphy is heading the University of Lethbridge as a student in the Faculty of Education and Avery McGuinness will be attending the University of British Columbia's Faculty of Science.

This is the 12th year that the annual scholarships have been presented to financially assist graduates in Cochrane and Springbank with their post-secondary studies.