The Fort Atkinson Community Foundation is pleased to announce that Krista Borchardt, a recent 2020 graduate of Fort Atkinson High School, has been awarded both a $2,400 Kathleen Grabil Thorndike Scholarship and a $2,000 Isabelle Mathews Education Scholarship. The Thorndike Scholarship will be paid over the next two years while the Mathews is a one-year award paid during the 2020-21 academic year.
Borchardt will be enrolling this fall at the University of Northwestern-St. Paul in Roseville, Minn. where she plans to earn a degree in elementary education.
The Kathleen Grabil Thorndike Scholarship Fund came to the Foundation through the School District of Fort Atkinson, which had received a bequest from the estate of E. J. and Elizabeth Thorndike of Monterey County, California, in honor of Kathleen Grabil Thorndike. The purpose of the scholarship is to provide financial assistance to a worthy graduating senior at Fort Atkinson High School.
The Isabelle Mathews Education Scholarship Fund was established by a gift to the Fort Atkinson Community Foundation from the estate of Isabelle Mathews. Mrs. Mathews was a graduate of Fort Atkinson High School and the Whitewater State Teachers College (now UW-Whitewater). She was an elementary school teacher for over 50 years, in Burlington and then at the University School in Milwaukee. She created this scholarship to help graduating seniors of Fort Atkinson High School who, like her, wanted to earn a college degree in education.
The Mathews Scholarship Fund was just one piece of Mrs. Mathews’ local philanthropy. In 2000, she funded a new flagpole and entrance landscaping for the Hoard Historical Museum and before that she donated funds to create the little Clocktower Pocket Park on North Main Street by the municipal building. She also is responsible for the attractive granite sign at Lakeview Cemetery on Janesville Avenue.
For more information about the Thorndike, Mathews or any of the scholarships offered by the Fort Atkinson Community Foundation, contact their executive director Sue Hartwick at (920) 563-3210 (office), or via email at facf@fortfoundation.org.