{"id":3004,"date":"2013-02-22T02:07:39","date_gmt":"2013-02-22T06:07:39","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/wwwcp.umes.edu\/pr\/?p=3004"},"modified":"2026-07-13T22:03:36","modified_gmt":"2026-07-14T02:03:36","slug":"alumnus-creates-freshman-scholarship-fund","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/wwwcp.umes.edu\/scm\/alumnus-creates-freshman-scholarship-fund\/","title":{"rendered":"Alumnus creates freshman scholarship fund"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<div class=\"wp-block-image\"><figure class=\"alignright size-large\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"399\" height=\"640\" src=\"https:\/\/wwwcp.umes.edu\/scm\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/219\/2021\/09\/Clifton-Harcum.jpg\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-3005\" srcset=\"https:\/\/wwwcp.umes.edu\/scm\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/219\/2021\/09\/Clifton-Harcum.jpg 399w, https:\/\/wwwcp.umes.edu\/scm\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/219\/2021\/09\/Clifton-Harcum-187x300.jpg 187w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 399px) 100vw, 399px\" \/><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Friday, February 22, 2013<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>PRINCESS ANNE, MD.<\/strong>&nbsp;&#8211; (Feb. 15, 2013) &#8211; Clifton Harcum, an alumnus and employee, sees creating a scholarship in his name as a way to&nbsp;pay it forward to high school students bound for UMES that were like him at that age.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">&#8220;I wanted to provide an opportunity to those who weren&#8217;t necessarily &#8220;A&#8221; or &#8220;B&#8221; students to receive funds for college, because I personally didn&#8217;t have a high GPA,&#8221; said Harcum.&nbsp;&nbsp;&#8220;I want them to know that regardless, I believe in them and know they have the potential to do great things.&#8221;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Harcum will award $1,000 annually; $250 each to a student from Somerset County&#8217;s Washington and Crisfield high schools and $500 to a student from his alma mater, St. Frances Academy in Baltimore.&nbsp;&nbsp;The student must have a minimum 2.5 GPA, have completed at least 20 community services hours and be involved in extras curricular activities.&nbsp;&nbsp;In addition, he said, they must be a future Hawk.&nbsp;&nbsp;The student must be accepted for enrollment as a freshman at UMES.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">&#8220;UMES has made a major impact in my life,&#8221; Harcum said.&nbsp;&nbsp;&#8220;I want to provide a similar, positive experience for other students.&nbsp;&nbsp;I believe in the education system here.&#8221;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Community service, a requirement of the scholarship, is also important to Harcum.&nbsp;&nbsp;He was recently recognized by WBOC TV-16 as the&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/www.umes.edu\/PR\/News-Articles\/UMES--Harcum-wins-2013-Jefferson-Award\/\"><strong>region&#8217;s Jefferson Award recipient<\/strong><\/a>&nbsp;for unselfishly giving his time and talents to the community.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Among many efforts of the heart, Harcum co-founded an organization to promote community outreach and development, has spear-headed an annual effort to feed families in need that provided 900 meals this Thanksgiving, and has established a Rotaract chapter at UMES as an active member of the Wicomico Rotary.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The scholarship will be awarded for the first time this spring.&nbsp;&nbsp;Harcum will present the award to recipients.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">&#8220;It&#8217;s a personal experience for me,&#8221; Harcum said. &#8220;I want to meet the students receiving the scholarship to give them some words of hope and support to better themselves.&#8221;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Harcum holds a bachelor&#8217;s degree in sociology and has taken graduate courses in guidance and counseling from UMES.&nbsp;&nbsp;As an area director of Residence Life for nearly a decade, he has used his background to shepherd many a student through their university experience.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Applicants meeting the criteria should pick up an application form in their high school guidance office and submit the necessary essay by an April 29 deadline.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Harcum welcomes donations of additional gifts to the scholarship fund.&nbsp;&nbsp;&#8220;My ultimate goal is to award $3,000 to each recipient,&#8221; he said.&nbsp;&nbsp;Contact the Institutional Advancement Office at 410-651-8045 to learn how.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><a href=\"mailto:gcstephens@umes.edu\"><strong>Gail Stephens<\/strong><\/a>,&nbsp;<em>assistant director of public relations, UMES, (410) 651-7980<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Friday, February 22, 2013 PRINCESS ANNE, MD.&nbsp;&#8211; (Feb. 15, 2013) &#8211; Clifton Harcum, an alumnus and employee, sees creating a scholarship in his name as a way to&nbsp;pay it forward to high school students bound for UMES that were like him at that age. &#8220;I wanted to provide an opportunity to those who weren&#8217;t necessarily&#8230;<span class=\"cpschool-read-more-link-holder\"><a class=\"btn btn-basic cpschool-read-more-link\" href=\"https:\/\/wwwcp.umes.edu\/scm\/alumnus-creates-freshman-scholarship-fund\/\">Read more <span class=\"sr-only\">Alumnus creates freshman scholarship fund<\/span><\/a><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":3005,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_coblocks_attr":"","_coblocks_dimensions":"","_coblocks_responsive_height":"","_coblocks_accordion_ie_support":"","wds_primary_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[103],"tags":[],"post_folder":[],"class_list":["post-3004","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/wwwcp.umes.edu\/scm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3004","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/wwwcp.umes.edu\/scm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/wwwcp.umes.edu\/scm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wwwcp.umes.edu\/scm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wwwcp.umes.edu\/scm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3004"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/wwwcp.umes.edu\/scm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3004\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wwwcp.umes.edu\/scm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/3005"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/wwwcp.umes.edu\/scm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3004"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wwwcp.umes.edu\/scm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3004"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wwwcp.umes.edu\/scm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3004"},{"taxonomy":"post_folder","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wwwcp.umes.edu\/scm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/post_folder?post=3004"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}