Touro Fraternal awards $5,000 college grants to Strachman, Cohen

CRANSTON – Elena Strachman and Jonathan Cohen have been awarded grants of $5,000 each from Touro Fraternal Association to assist in their pursuit of higher education degrees.

Strachman is a freshman at the University of Vermont, where she is studying nursing. She graduated from Lincoln-Sudbury (Mass.) Regional High School where she earned her school’s Martin Luther King Community Service award for the last two years. She was also a facilitator for Students Together Opposing Prejudice (STOP) and volunteered at both a local animal shelter and at girls’ softball youth clinics.

In addition, Strachman was a counselor-in-training at Camp Tevya, a Jewish camp in Brookline, N.H. She is the daughter of Jeffrey Strachman, a Touro member.

Cohen, who is a Touro brother, is a junior at the University of Vermont and is studying wildlife and fisheries biology. He will be doing wildlife monitoring and conservation work in Botswana next spring.

To earn his Eagle Scout honor with the Boy Scouts, Cohen participated in trail maintenance in his hometown Hawkins Woods in Plainville, Mass.

Strachman and Cohen were awarded the grants, which do not have to be repaid, by Touro’s Student Financial Aid Committee. Five other applicants will receive $3,500 each in interest-free loans from Touro’s Leo Greenberg Memorial Scholarship Fund. These loans are not repayable until six months after the student graduates or is no longer a full-time student.

Since the establishment of the student grant and loan programs in 1981, Touro has made financial awards to ease the cost of higher education. Regular Touro members, their children and the children of deceased Touro members who are enrolled full time in a tax-exempt accredited institution of higher learning, are eligible to apply for a one-time $5,000 grant or for an interest-free loan. In both cases, regular Touro members must be members in good standing for at least two years to be eligible.

For more information about Touro’s loan and grant programs, as well as many other benefits offered to its membership, visit the website at www.tourofraternal.org or send an email to info@tourofraternal.org. You can also call the office at 401-785-0066.

Submitted by Touro Fraternal Association