Students at Lopez Early College High School are getting major encouragement from McDonald’s Hispanic owner-operators to apply for college scholarships and specifically some $500,000 in McDonald’s 2022-2023 HACER National Scholarships.
Representatives from Cool Speak, McDonald’s youth engagement company, spent the day Tuesday at Lopez sharing information with students and their parents about how to get the HACER National and other college scholarships
On Wednesday the stage moved to the University of Texas Rio Grande Valley-Brownsville, where Cool Speak and UTRGV representatives helped the students complete the Free Application for Federal Student Aid and apply for the HACER National and other college scholarships.
“Today the message was to inform the parents of the scholarship opportunity but also to thank them for supporting their students and also so they can express their love and appreciation towards one another in a more in-depth manner,” Ernesto Mejia of Cool Speak said after his presentation.
Everyone who wanted a meal got one courtesy of a McDonald’s food truck parked on site.
“This right here is because of the HACER Foundation. It’s just to increase awareness about the scholarship opportunities out there. We”re the only South Texas school chosen, we’re one of two in Texas and we’re one of only 30 in the nation.,” Lopez Principal Aimee Garza said.
She added that the Hispanic McDonald’s owner-operators’ stories “match our stories as far as coming up from humble homes, low socio-economic status, just the struggle, because they struggled, but they made it. As far as scholarships, its just like the lottery, you can’t win if you don’t play. You can’t get a scholarship if you don’t apply.”
Mejia’s presentation, mainly in Spanish, drew applause and laughter numerous times.
“The HACER Scholarship was created by the Hispanic McDonald’s owner-operators. They fund it out of their own pockets. The scholarship, the tour, all of this. Everything was free for the school today. It’s funded by them and its their way of giving back to the community and helping other Hispanic students to succeed and to take away a worry, which is tuition,” Mejia said.
Velma Rios and her son Xavier Ohuille, sat in the second row at the 5:30 p.m. presentation.
“We found out about it through Ms. (Pilar) Janis, she’s an amazing counselor,” Rios said. “She’s helped our seniors go to their colleges helping them out with scholarships. She’s amazing. Hopefully my son will apply, he has honors. He’s probably going to graduate with an associate’s already and he’s going to the university in Corpus (Christi) to study kinesiology.”
Ohuille said what was being offered represented “a great opportunity for students to learn what colleges are out there, what opportunities there are and just basically know what their future is ahead of them.”
The UTRGV GEAR UP College in ACTion! office coordinated the events.
“GEAR UP is a program that helps students that maybe are first generation college students or maybe come from low socioeconomic homes, to help them get motivated for college. You start with them in seventh grade and we’re with them until they finish their first year of college,” director Martha A. Cantu, Ed.D., said.
“It can be college, university, a certification program, but we want our kids to be ready for their future. This kind of event is for the community, for the parents, to inform them about the scholarships so they can nudge their kids to apply, and of course the kids here in Brownsville they’re amazing, hard working. We’re already talking to them so that when they come to the university, they’re going to have a support system right away.”
