A new scholarship rewarding current students for referring prospective students to Marywood is set to begin as soon as possible, according to Sr. Mary Persico, IHM, Ed.D., president of Marywood.

Sr. Mary said increasing the school’s enrollment is “really important” to her. This new scholarship, named the “Sister Mary Scholarship” by the Student Government Association (SGA) and developed jointly by Sr. Mary and SGA, aims to do just that.

According to Sr. Mary, incoming students will submit the names of current students who helped them make their decision to attend Marywood along with their deposits. When the period for deposit submissions ends, the student who referred the most new students will claim a $2,000 scholarship, with the runner-up receiving $1,000.

Sr. Mary said the Admissions Department will decide the date for the competition to begin.

Maria Temples, SGA president, said that “part of SGA’s goals this semester is to increase enrollment.”

She added, “I thought, ‘what if we had a competition where students could help recruit students?’”

Temples said she discussed the scholarship with Sr. Mary at her September meeting with SGA, and added that Sr. Mary thought it was a great idea.

Temples said the application for current students still has some details that need to be finalized. She added the University will “hopefully…be able to send it out to students by the end of the semester so that they can start recruiting students over Christmas break.”

Temples said she enjoyed working with Sr. Mary on this project. She described the process as “fluid and flexible” and explained that everyone involved in it was “very receptive.”

“Students are really excited about it,” Temples said.

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