The Franklin High School Educational Foundation is delighted to recognize longtime donor Regina Stagg for the generous spirit she brings to our work. For the past decade, Ms. Stagg has reliably donated to the Foundation to help support our mission to empower Franklin High School graduating seniors to pursue higher educational goals by providing them […]

Brenden Cerritos (FHS Class of 2025) traveled a good distance from Highland Park to start on an engineering path at UC San Diego – and he is already knee-deep in the kind of schedule that makes calculators sweat! He told us that he is presently tackling Calculus II, along with Chemistry, English, and an Intro

Jocelyn Dominguez (FHS Class of 2025) has already settled in at Cal State LA and is officially on the “future teacher” track – because some Panthers don’t just take classes, they plan to run the classroom! She’s majoring in Urban Learning and told us she has jumped right into the College of Education lineup, including child

Bryan Martinez (FHS Class of 2025) is currently sprinting through the Pasadena City College Honors Program, balancing Cultural Anthropology, Philosophy, Public Speaking, and Psychology, all while keeping his long-term goal in view: medical school. After last year’s UCLA waitlist turned into a “not this time,” Bryan didn’t sulk. Instead, he built a smart game plan

Ileanna Cruz-Parra (FHS Class of 2025) has settled in at Pasadena City College, where she is majoring in Health Science and making herself at home — counseling, EOP&S, and the Transfer Center are basically her new “campus pit crew.” Ileanna has also leaned into campus life: She volunteered at the Club Fair and has gone

Tiffany Rodriguez (FHS Class of 2025) has officially traded Panther halls for Matador pride at Cal State Northridge – and yes, she’s dorming, which turned out to be the biggest “moving day” of her life so far. “Moving away from home was challenging for me because I am molded to be family oriented,” she told

Pasadena City College student Alejandro Duenas (FHS Class of 2025) expressed that the award he received from our Foundation made him feel that the community he grew up in wants him to succeed. He is also grateful for the financial support provided by the award, which has helped cover fees and essential classroom materials like

For Mark Jared Dela Cruz (FHS Class of 2025), his educational journey has been illuminated by hope, determination, and the generous support of the Franklin High School Educational Foundation. Mark’s story is still being written, but thanks to the financial award given to him by our Foundation, the next chapters are filled with promise. In

Recently, the Foundation has taken a remarkable step to preserve its history for generations to come: We have begun videotaping co-founder Jack Wright as he recounts the compelling story of how it all began. Long before the Franklin High School Educational Foundation became a pillar of support for our graduating seniors, it existed as a

Each year at our annual awards ceremony, the Franklin High School Educational Foundation shines a spotlight on student achievement and the generosity of our donors. At this year’s highly anticipated awards ceremony, the Foundation proudly distributed an impressive $197,000 in financial awards to 193 deserving students. The event not only celebrated academic excellence, it also

Adrian Villa (FHS Class of 2024) was happy to provide our Foundation with a picture of himself on campus at Cal State University Northridge — he loves it there! He told us that he is grateful that he had the support at Franklin High School to make it to CSUN, where he plans on majoring

The first thing that Lizbeth is going to do with the financial award that our Foundation gave her is buy a new pair of glasses. She has been wearing the same pair of glasses for five years and feels that her prescription has drastically changed during that time — she has struggled to see the

Vanessa took her Franklin Educational Foundation award with her to major in aerospace engineering at Cal Poly Pomona. She chose this major because she is interested in being closer to the stars. Vanessa told us, “I feel like the stars provide so much peace. I think that there is potential for providing a form of

This year’s winner of the esteemed Antypas family memorial scholarship award, Milo Straw, is on his way to Lewis and Clark College. There he plans to pursue an education to become a teacher because he feels it will enable him to impact his community. As he sees it, “everything trickles back down – if I

TheEastsiderLA.com is the best source for news about Highland Park and our Foundation was so pleased to find out that we made an appearance on their website. Good news for all involved!

Pictured here are the winners of the prestigious Tenner-Wright award, our Foundation’s award for the top six students. The top 3 students will have the Foundation’s financial support for all four years that they attend college and the other 3 will have the Foundation’s financial support for two of their college years. From left to

In addition to presenting the Franklin High School graduating seniors with financial awards that help them meet their college expenses, the Franklin High School Educational Foundation loves to find other creative ways to support Franklin’s college-bound students. This time, the Foundation came up with the clever idea of collecting suitcases to give to the students

At an awards assembly on May 29th, the Foundation was able to award a total of $197,400 to approximately 154 students in the graduating class of 2024. Each financial award was at least $600, up to $1,400. It made for some very happy students!

Most anybody with a connection to Franklin High School knows of Mr. Jack Wright. He is a former College Counselor at Franklin and one of our Foundation’s co-founders. Almost unbelievably, at 86 years old Mr. Wright is more energetic than ever and he is still working to support the students at Franklin High School! This

Matthew Delgado (FHS Class of 2023) took his Franklin Educational Foundation financial award with him to Cal State LA where he is majoring in Biology. He thanked the foundation for the award and told us that he plans to spend it on books and tuition. He added, “Although it may not sound important, the money

Elijah Gil (FHS Class of 2023) is excited about life and says he can’t wait to see what is next for him. He started at UC Davis in the fall semester of ’23 and is majoring in Chemistry. He sees a future for himself in the medical field. He used the money from his Franklin

Gabriella Ortega (FHS Class of 2023) has big plans and we on the foundation board love to see that! She plans to become a travel nurse. “Travel nursing has always been a dream of mine because I love helping people and I love traveling so it would be the perfect combination,” says Gabriella. Currently she

Carime Lopez (FHS Class of 2023) started school at Cal State Los Angeles this fall with a few extra dollars in her pocket thanks to an award from the Franklin High School Educational Foundation. “This wonderful award will provide me so much help in making sure I succeed in school,” says Carime. “I want to

We get the most wonderful emails from our award recipients! Benjamin Solis (FHS Class of 2023) is attending Chico State University, and he tells us that he is “honored and thrilled to have the opportunity to attend a university with an amazing scholarship in hand.” He continues, “With the money awarded to me I will

The Franklin High School Educational Foundation was fortunate enough this year to be able to grant $184,400 to Franklin’s graduating seniors that are bound for college. The joyous ceremony was held on May 23rd and the students celebrated — all that money made them very happy! Our co-founder Mr. Jack Wright poses with the happy

After two years of the Awards Ceremony being held virtually, this year the ceremony was held in person — yay!! Awards in the amount of $186,800 were given to 158 students. We think that is something to celebrate!

On August 1, 2021, our Foundation was featured in a news story in The Boulevard Sentinel, Highland Park’s local newspaper. The news article was entitled, “Valuable scholarships help pave the way to college for Franklin High’s top graduates.” To read the article, click on “Read More” below, then click on the link. Click on the

Congratulations to the Class of 2021! These resilient and determined scholars were awarded their “lifetime loans” in a virtual ceremony on May 26, 2021. Awards totaling $182,800 were granted to 165 students in this exciting ceremony done on Zoom.

Even during these times of the Covid-19 pandemic, the members of our Board still managed to show their indomitable spirit with an exciting birthday celebration for our co-founder Jack Wright. We did the traditional pandemic “drive-by” acknowledgment of this momentous occasion and ended it with this wonderful photo op. The Board would also like to share that

Dear Board Members and Friends, I am so sorry to share the news that Mort passed away June 22nd around 4 p.m. at the age of 92.  He just celebrated his birthday, June 10. Mort served at Franklin for 17 years (1967 to 1984), the longest of any principal.  He was moved “downtown” to help

Currently residing in Australia, Panther Louise Woo says, “You never know where life might take you, but with a good education you can go everywhere.” We love that! She made a donation in honor of Mr. Don Palus saying, “Mr. Palus was one of my most influential teachers. So glad to see a scholarship in his honor!” Louise sent us a wonderful email, which we would like to share with you:I’m very pleased to be the first PayPal donor to FEF. I’m a little surprised FEF hasn’t gone digital sooner.

On May 21, 2019, the Franklin Educational Foundation awarded 154 students “lifetime loans” in the total amount of $177,000!! This means that over half of the graduating class received awards. These Franklin students were very happy that they are going to get help with paying their college expenses.

Students pursue Franklin High School’s College Counselor Miss Soldevilla in order to obtain applications for the Franklin Educational Foundation scholarships. Students have a chance to be awarded a scholarship with a minimum amount of $900.00! No wonder they are so happy to apply.

Franklin High School’s Academic Decathlon Team took 6th place out of 68 and we think that is really something to celebrate! Congratulations to the team — all of your hard work paid off!