SOUTH LAKE TAHOE, Calif. – A Lake Tahoe Community College graduate will have the opportunity to continue her education thanks to a $10,000 scholarship from the Gene Upshaw Memorial Scholarship Fund.
Each year, starting in 2009, at the American Century Championship, Gary Quinn, NBC Vice President of Programming & General Manager and Terry Upshaw, Gene’s widow, present a scholarship to a deserving student.
This year’s student, Kettja Bennett talked about her troubled upbringing, how her past inspired her to provide a more stable home to her future children than she had growing up and how this scholarship will help achieve that goal.
During a press conference at the tournament, Quinn talked about the legacy Upshaw left behind and the impact he had on Quinn personally.
“It’s very important to us to continue to embrace the legacy of the people who have meant so much to us and be a part and fabric of this community,” said Quinn. “This community has embraced us and we want to embrace it back.”
“Gene would give his time to anybody and everybody because that’s just who Gene was,” said Terry following Quinn’ s comments.
Gene Upshaw Memorial Scholarship Fund recipients should embody the traits Gene valued, including leadership, giving and someone who pays it forward.
Bennett not only embodies those traits but overcame hardships and still came out on the other end being thoughtful and hardworking.
According to Bennett, she never met, or even knew who her father was. Her mother suffered from mental health and addiction issues, leading to Bennett being put into foster care at the age of 6, along with her younger sister.
Bennett and her sister lived in several foster homes before they were finally adopted about six years later.
“One thing that sits in the back of my head is, I don’t want to end up how my birth mom was and make my kids go through what I did,” said Bennett. “There’s a couple things I want to do before I have kids and that is having my own home… just a stable home. The other thing is a good paying job, I want to be financially stable and the reason college is so important to me and this scholarship is that it will let me get to that point in life.”
Despite discussing her challenging childhood, Bennett is still able to joke about her situation.
“I don’t have a mom or dad that I can call up and ask them questions like, ‘what do I wear to a golf tournament,’” she laughed.
During her time at LTCC, she worked full-time in forest management. She will use this scholarship to pay for her first year of college at University of Nevada, Reno where she will study to get her Mechanical Engineering degree.
“It’s interesting, and I think Gary will agree with me, every year we say, ‘how can this be,” said Terry following Bennett’s story. “It’s just remarkable, the caliber of individuals that are selected… I’m glad I don’t have to do the selection process, it’s remarkable.”
While Bennett has herself to thank for her hardwork and determination, she credits LTCC for some of her success.
“Walking in the first day, I was going to the Promise program and they all just helped me a lot,” said Bennett. “Once I started at UNR July 1, I’m talking this Calculus 3 class and all of it is a review for me, that’s saying something about the teachers at Lake Tahoe Community College.”
“They were just all so supportive and it pretty awesome going to school there and I’m glad that’s the path I decided to go,”
Gary ended the press conference saying that he speaks for NBC when he says Bennett is now and will always be part of the NBC family, which Terry agreed with.
