Posted 9:47 a.m. Monday, Nov. 17, 2014
Continuing to support the women and message of SSP
UWL alumna Audreyona Chavez-Lorenz, who completed the Self Sufficiency Program in 2004, was the keynote speaker at this year's Self Sufficiency Locally Grown Breakfast fundraiser Nov. 12 in the Cleary Alumni & Friends Center.
UWL Alumna Audreyona Chavez-Lorenz, emerging half-defeated from a life of struggle, found her bearings as a successful college student through the Self Sufficiency Program, she says. In spring 2003, when she entered SSP, a free, one-semester program that offers participants an opportunity to discover their academic and career potential, she was uncertain if she could make it as a college student. "It seems that we all were contemplating the same question … can I do this?" she said in a speech she gave at the Locally Grown Breakfast in 2006.
"A few weeks into class, the atmosphere had changed, we all had blossomed, no longer the doubting, self-conscious ladies that had tiptoed in on the first night, we knew we wanted to be in college and were determined to get there.”
Chavez-Lorenz was back on campus for this year's breakfast — this time as the keynote speaker receiving a standing ovation from the approximately 90 who attended the annual Self Sufficiency Program Locally Grown Scholarship Breakfast Nov. 12 in the Cleary Alumni & Friends Center. Chavez-Lorenz finished SSP in May 2004 and graduated from UW-L in 2009 with a degree in microbiology. Although she is intent on pursuing more education in the future, she's currently content working at Organic Valley, a company committed to improving lives and communities in the region, she says.
She continues to support the women and message of SSP. Most SSP graduates attend UW-L, Viterbo University or Western Technical College. The breakfast raises funds for student-parent scholarships for those in their first four semesters of college. Four women received scholarships at the breakfast, including:
- Angi Hoch
- Susan Niemi
- Ashley St. Sauver
- Vanessa Thompson
For more information about SSP and how to donate, email Andrea Hansen at ahansen@uwlax.edu. Donations to SSP are tax deductible. For photos of the event go to http://goo.gl/lT3eQs.
