Radwa Ali from High School South and Gemma Scheck from High School North received the annual scholarships from the West Windsor-Plainsboro News. They are both beginning their freshman year at colleges this fall.
Ali, a Plainsboro resident since 1995, was born in Alexandria, Egypt. She will be at student at Rutgers University in the fall where she hopes to pursue political science, history, and English literature studies.
In high school she was a member of stage crew for two years and a member of the National Honor Society. President of the Diversity Club her junior and senior years, she was on the committee that organized the evening featuring Judy Shepard in April. Shepard is the executive director of the foundation created after her son Matthew, 21, was murdered in an anti-gay hate crime in Laramie, Wyoming.
A volunteer with the Plainsboro Rescue Squad since she was 14, Ali took and passed the Emergency Medical Technician class and obtained her EMT certification when she was 16. She was captain of the Cadet Corps of the Rescue Squad during her junior and senior years until she had to resign that post due to scheduling conflicts with a playwriting workshop at McCarter Theater. She also volunteered at the University Medical Center at Princeton for three years.
She began volunteering at the Plainsboro Public Library when she was in the eighth grade, was hired in her freshman year, and has worked there since.
From May, 2005, to May 2006, Ali was a staff writer, editor, and blogger for SEX, etc, a teen health magazine run by Rutgers University. All the content is written by high school teens, for teens. Ali wrote several articles and blogs.
Her father, Ali Ali, is a technician at Filterfresh Coffee Excellence. Her mother, Samia Gabal,is a homemaker. Her two sisters, Riham Nassar and Rania Shalaby, are college graduates, and are married with children. Riham, who lives in Connecticut, is a systems analyst with Hewitt Associates, and Rania is a respiratory therapist in Florida.
Scheck, a Plainsboro resident for close to two years, was born in New Brunswick and lived in Jamesburg for most of her life. An only child, she lives with her mother, Marie Scheck. At North she was involved in the musical “Oklahoma!,” spring track, Silver Lining (the women’s a cappella group), and concert choir.
She plans to attend Mercer County Community College for a year or two and then transfer to Rutgers University in New Brunswick. Although she is not sure of her major or career choices yet, she knows she is interested in psychology.
In her yearbook she quotes hip hop singer and actor Lauryn Hill. “Everything is everything. What is meant to be, will be. After winter must come spring. Change, will come eventually.”
