Laraine Thompson, winner of the Amy Kurland-Toney Memorial Scholarship, is a 38-year-old mother of three. She had her first son at a young age. After two years of college she had to drop out due to the hardships of being a young, single mom. She had always wanted to go back to college to finish her degree, but life got in the way for a while. Before COVID her time was spent on two jobs as well as caring for her children. During the quarantine Loraine realized she did not want to go back to that. She wanted to do something to better her life and so she decided to further her education at Bucks County Community College (BCCC). Her children have become her biggest support team and are very proud of her!
The cost of schooling had held her back from attending school again. She is currently enrolled in BCCC for an Associate’s Degree in Business Administration. She is continuing her education after an 18-year break, something she had wanted to do for a long time. She is finally taking the steps to work towards this goal and would love to own her own business one day.
Ralphlyn Randall, winner of the Judith Peter Memorial Scholarship, is a mother of three and the legal guardian of her nephew. In 2013 Ralphlyn and her family migrated to the United States of America for a better life but her husband became ill and passed away in 2016 while seeking treatment. Since then, she has been fending for her children by herself as well as pursuing her educational goals. She applied for this scholarship to assist her financially in buying school books and meeting other educational needs.
As Ralphlyn sees it, nursing is a unique field that is accessible to anyone with the passion to help people. Her educational goal is to become a nurse practitioner and to help her community. She presently works with children and adults with developmental, intellectual and physical disabilities. Working with them and seeing the challenges serves as a motivating factor for her.
She is determined to complete her college studies and also improve the well-being of her family.