HELENA – Kids Chance of Montana has announced its first round of scholarships.
The newly-formed Montana chapter is part of a 30-year-old organization that hands out scholarships to children who have had a parent killed or seriously injured in a workplace accident.
Montana chapter President Peter Vannice says they received six applications and awarded all six students with $2,500 scholarships.
The applicants are from across Montana: Missoula, Roundup, Helena, East Helena, Billings and Bozeman.
Three will be attending MSU, one will go to U of M, and the others are all finalizing which school they will attend.
Vannice says he recently returned from the Kids Chance national convention. There are currently 43 states with chapters and seven states hope to have chapters in place by the end of the year.
(FEBRUARY 12, 2018) A 30-year-old organization that hands out scholarships to children who have had a parent killed or seriously injured in a workplace accident has a new chapter in Montana.
It’s called Kids Chance of Montana. Originally started in 1988 in Alabama, the newly-formed Montana chapter is now gathering donations for scholarships that will be handed out later this spring.
But they also need applicants.
Board President Peter Van Nice says you can go online to their website to learn more about eligibility and how you or someone you know can apply.
“We have a scholarship application on kidschanceofmontana.org and the application is out there,” explains Van Nice. “So we’re getting the word out to school systems, school counselors, whoever we can reach just to make sure we can get that information into the hands of the kids while they’re applying. So the deadline will be March 31st of this year and we hope to award our first scholarship by May. We think it’s a niche that has to be filled and we think we can fill it.”
Montana consistently ranks in the top five for workplace deaths and injuries. There were 38 work-related deaths in Montana in 2016.
