4 BILINGUAL TEENS IN VALLEY AREA WIN SCHOLARSHIPS.Byline: Steve Getzug Daily News Staff Writer When she was young, Susan Lee was ashamed of her Korean heritage, and she figured Sunday classes at a Korean school or the language of her parents wasn't her ticket to success in America. Looking back, Lee says it was all child's talk. ``I've learned that having a different background helps you understand situations better, widens perspective,'' says Lee, a Chatsworth High School senior who is packing her bags for Stanford University next fall. ``You can always help someone out.'' At 17, Lee speaks three languages - Korean, English and Spanish. She's active at the Valley So Mang Presbyterian Church. And her weighted 4.90 grade-point average portends great things in chemical engineering, her anticipated major. Lee is one of 10 Los Angeles high school Los Angeles High School, founded in 1873, is the oldest public high school in the Southern California Region and in the Los Angeles Unified School District. Its colors are blue and white and the teams are called the Romans. students - four from San Fernando Valley-area schools - who will enter college with $5,000 scholarships awarded Thursday through the MCI (1) (Media Control Interface) A high-level programming interface from Microsoft and IBM for controlling multimedia devices. It provides commands and functions to open, play and close the device. (2) (Microwave Communications Inc. International Scholar Awards Program. The Virginia-based telecommunications company has handed out the scholarships for three years to deserving bilingual students. More than 800 students applied for the scholarships in Los Angeles. To make their decisions, judges reviewed academic accomplishments, extracurricular activities and essays. In addition to Lee, scholarship recipients include Jerry Lai from Van Nuys High School Van Nuys High School (VNHS) established in 1914, is a high school in the Van Nuys area of Los Angeles, California, belonging to the Los Angeles Unified School District: District 2. ; Jonathan Maack from North Hollywood High School North Hollywood High School, originally called Lankershim High School when it opened in 1927, is a secondary school in North Hollywood in Los Angeles, California. The school mascot is the husky, and the school colors are blue, white, grey. and Yoko Matsumoto from Crescenta Valley High School Crescenta Valley High School is an secondary school located at 2900 Community Avenue in La Crescenta-Montrose, an unincorporated community in Los Angeles County, California, United States. The school is a part of the Glendale Unified School District. . Lai, 17, from Canoga Park, has a 4.55 GPA GPA abbr. grade point average Noun 1. GPA - a measure of a student's academic achievement at a college or university; calculated by dividing the total number of grade points received by the total number attempted and hopes to attend Stanford. He speaks English and Mandarin. Maack, 17, from Los Angeles, has a 4.5 GPA and wants to attend the University of California at Berkeley (body, education) University of California at Berkeley - (UCB) See also Berzerkley, BSD. http://berkeley.edu/. Note to British and Commonwealth readers: that's /berk'lee/, not /bark'lee/ as in British Received Pronunciation. to major in French and art history. He speaks French and English. Matsumoto, 17, of La Crescenta, has a 4.52 GPA and plans to attend Columbia University. Asian-international studies is her anticipated major. She speaks English and Japanese. In all of their essays, the winners cited the importance of communicating in languages other than English LOTE or Languages Other Than English is the name given to language subjects at Australian schools. LOTEs have often historically been related to the policy of multiculturalism, and tend to reflect the predominant non-English languages spoken in a school's local area, the in their personal growth and in carving out their positions in the world community. In Lee's case, it means embracing her heritage as she mixes within ``the salad bowl.'' ``Without the possession of at least two languages, not only can one personally not achieve the best opportunities available, but the country as a whole can never unify and tear down the walls that divide it,'' Lee wrote. ``I treasure the beauty and the practicality of the languages I have acquired in my lifetime, and I am certain that they have and will give me an edge in anything I decide to do.'' CAPTION(S): Photo PHOTO A $5,000 MCI college scholarship goes to each high sc hool student - Jerry Lai, left, Yoko Matsumoto, Jonathan Maack and Susan Lee. Gus Ruelas/Daily News |
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