Westlake High Student Gets Prestigious OSU Scholarship

From Westlake City School District: Westlake High School senior Selma Babiker is the recipient of The Ohio State University’s acclaimed Morrill Scholarship Program Excellence Scholarship.

The scholarship recognizes students’ commitment to excellence and diversity initiatives. The Excellence Scholarship is equal to the value of in-state tuition. The Morrill Scholarship Program (MSP) seeks academically exceptional high school seniors who will contribute to campus diversity and who actively engage as advocates and champions of diversity, inclusion and academic excellence on campus. The MSP rewards more than 300 scholarships annually to high school seniors.

Selma, a first-generation Sudanese student, is a member of the school’s Diversity arm in Leadership Challenge and helped plan the recent WHS Diversity Week. She helped decide different foods to serve each day and organized a Diversity Fair, which included students performing Greek dances, Salsa, Irish music and Irish dancers. Each foreign language club had a booth about different cultures, and students were invited to place a sticker on a world map indicating their cultural background.

Last year Selma also was part of the high school’s Cultural Fair, which invited students from different cultures to provide information on their country of origin and educate fellow students about their culture and heritage.

She and fellow student Fatimah Alnaseri also picked up a flag project begun by an International Baccalaureate student. They secured a grant from the PTSA and ordered flags from every country that are on display through the hallways of WHS.

On March 9, Selma sat on an immigration panel at the Diversity Center of Cleveland’s High School Conference at John Carroll University. The panel aimed to help students develop an understanding of how immigration has come to influence the cultural, economic, political and social landscapes of the nation.

Photo courtesy of the Westlake City School District