Copperas Cove Citizens Fire & Public Safety Volunteers award scholarships

By BRITTANY FHOLER 
Cove Leader-Press 

The Copperas Cove Citizens Fire and Public Safety Volunteers Association held a ceremony awarding $2,000 in the Shelby Fletcher and Dee Dee Helgren Memorial Scholarship to two college students and Copperas Cove graduates. 
The ceremony took place Monday evening in the Police Department Community Room. 
The scholarship program was founded in memory of Shelby Fletcher and Dee Dee Helgren. Fletcher was the granddaughter of CFPSVA members James and Cathy Stockman, who passed away in 2015. Helgren was the Stockmans’ daughter, who passed away in 2017. 
The program seeks to assist children of first responders and was opened to the Law Enforcement Explorers Program this year. Selection of recipients is based upon a variety of aspects such as need, character, leadership and citizenship. 
This year’s recipients were Andrew Carter and McKenna Miller, with each receiving $1,000. Though this was Carter’s first time receiving the scholarship, Miller was a recipient of the $1,000 scholarship from the CFPSVA last year.
 “We’re just glad that we can do this, and we’ll continue to do it as long as we’ve got people supporting us and we’ve got the money,” Cathy Stockman said to the crowd. 
James Stockman said the scholarship is very important, beyond honoring his granddaughter and daughter. 
“Education is big in my life,” Stockman said. “I believe in education because the more you know, the better off you can be, the further you can go in life.”
He added that the group sets an example for the kids and wants them to go on and be better.
Carter is attending Texas State University in San Marcos in the fall and is majoring in theater education. 
“This is my first year going to college, and the way our college works is our bills are actually quite cheap, and I have got a good bit of scholarship money from there, so my latter years aren’t too big of a problem, but my first year, we’re required to live on campus, and the campus bill is very, very high, and so this helps a lot with that,” Carter said. 
Miller is attending the University of Texas at San Antonio and majoring in education with a minor in kinesiology. 
“This will be my second year in college, and so I’ve got to experience all the expenses and just books, outside of tuition living expenses, and so this will help greatly towards that, and it’s a big weight lifted off of my shoulders to know I have some support behind that,” Miller said. “I’m really grateful for the opportunity.”
Miller said that she was grateful for the all the program does and said she was very appreciative of the organization “making an investment in our future.”
“I just think this is a great way to support and remember the people that the scholarship is named after,” Carter added. “I had a lot of a personal relationship with both of them and I think this is a good way to keep them in memory.”
Sponsors of this year’s scholarship included Jeannie Layman, Thomas Palmer, Shawn Camp, Dr. Bala-INDTAI Inc. and Cali Signs.