The Gilman Center on the SUNY Orange campus in Middletown. The foundation's scholarship ceremony was held at the Paramount Theatre downtown. Photo: Socommteam, CC BY-SA 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons.
The SUNY Orange Foundation awarded more than $542,000 in scholarships to 238 students for the 2026-27 academic year at its annual ceremony on Oct. 7, Mid-Hudson News reported. The event was held at the Paramount Theatre in Middletown, at 17 South Street, with doors at 6 p.m. and the program at 7, according to the foundation’s ceremony page.
“We are incredibly grateful to the community of donors whose generosity made it possible for SUNY Orange Foundation to award more than half a million dollars in scholarships again this year,” Executive Director Kristin Jensen said, according to Mid-Hudson News. She said the awards help ease financial burdens and remind students that people in the community believe in their potential.
Second-year student Wani Miguel, a music major and recipient of the Middletown Lions Club Scholarship, opened the evening with an a cappella performance of the national anthem, the paper reported. Foundation board member and alumnus Adam McCarey, Class of 1996, discussed the Barbara Gobeo Scholarship, which he and his sister, Kimberly McCarey, Class of 1991, established in honor of their mother; Mid-Hudson News said it supports single parents returning to school. Nursing student Stella Page, the student representative on the foundation board, and Mawiz Gilani, recipient of the Dean George F. Shepard Business Scholarship, also spoke. Gilani said the award has allowed him to work fewer hours and spend more time on his studies.
President Kristine Young closed the ceremony by congratulating the recipients and thanking their families and donors, Mid-Hudson News reported. The foundation said the scholarship application portal for 2027-28 is scheduled to open in January 2027.
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