{"id":28934,"date":"2021-03-12T00:30:13","date_gmt":"2021-03-12T05:30:13","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/?p=28934"},"modified":"2021-03-12T00:32:54","modified_gmt":"2021-03-12T05:32:54","slug":"philanthropy-and-small-business-helps-aurora-student-land-prestigious-scholarship","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/philanthropy-and-small-business-helps-aurora-student-land-prestigious-scholarship\/","title":{"rendered":"Philanthropy and small business helps Aurora student land prestigious scholarship"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

For the last seven years, Avery Benlolo has devoted her spare time to making a difference in the lives of local women in need.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Together with her sisters Lexi and Amanda, they founded the Pampered Pillowcase, an organization delivering items to brighten the lives of these women, regardless of their circumstances. In just a few short years, the Pampered Pillowcase program has mushroomed from their Aurora basement to chapters across North America. Now, their efforts have reaped some unexpected dividends: earning Avery a place among just 50 students nation-wide receiving the Chancellor\u2019s Scholarship from Queen\u2019s University.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Nominations for the Queen\u2019s University Chancellor\u2019s Scholarship are open to many Canadian high schools and the number of nominees each place of learning is allowed to submit is determined by the size of the school itself. As a student at an independent school, Avery was the sole nominee this year from King\u2019s Country Day School.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cOnce you\u2019re nominated, there\u2019s a really long application process that included a few different essays, your transcript, a reference letter, and a creative component,\u201d says Avery. \u201cI didn\u2019t hear back for a few months, but I was anxiously waiting.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

At the same time as she applied for the scholarship, Avery applied to Queen\u2019s Commerce program and, within the span of a week, she found out she was twice lucky.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI was celebrating with the whole family that I got into the program I wanted to get into and then later I got another email that I had won the scholarship and it put me and my entire family over the moon,\u201d she says.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

During the application process, Avery highlighted the work she, Lexi and Amanda carried out to make the Pampered Pillowcase the success it continues to be. In addition, when prompted to write an essay demonstrating her leadership ability, she had the perfect point of reference: Sweet Scrubs N\u2019 Stuff, a small business she launched selling naturally sourced bath products at the Aurora Farmers\u2019 Market.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI was able to talk about how this gave me a big sense of independence, how I learned to be responsible and work on my own, and how I would sometimes face issues out there on my own,\u201d she says. \u201cWe had a lot of opportunities growing up and we have always known how important it is to give back.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWhen we started the Pampered Pillowcase, it was just our chapter in York Region not doing a crazy amount of pillow cases each year, but it was really nice to give back in a unique way with some products for women who are struggling and not in as good a circumstance as we are feel pampered, remembered and special. When we started it, it was a really amazing feeling and now we\u2019re looking at where we have grown all across North America with almost a dozen chapters. It is great to see the impact we\u2019ve had and how many young girls around North America are having that same feeling as us, being so happy they were able to make a difference.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

When Avery heads to Kingston this year to take up her program at Queen\u2019s, she will be among family.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Both of her sisters currently attend Queens, where Lexi was also a recipient of the Chancellor\u2019s Scholarship. Together, they have looked at ways to continue giving back in their new community, particularly to give a helping hand to women.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI think all these things I have been doing and all these smaller-scale businesses that I have been a part of are kind of building up and hopefully one day they will allow me to create something really great,\u201d says Avery. \u201cIn this moment and throughout my career, I am still young and I want to be able to learn as much as I can to develop as many skills as I can to one day hopefully run a business and be a great entrepreneur.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cMy whole family \u2013 sisters and parents \u2013 have been so supportive through everything. They\u2019re so ecstatic that we have been able to get these great achievements and we\u2019re all going to be in the same place. A lot of the things I have been able to accomplish in getting into Queen\u2019s and getting this scholarship I don\u2019t think would have been possible without some of the incredible teachers I\u2019ve had and all the support from my family. They are always there to be behind me and support me through anything.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

By Brock Weir<\/strong>
Editor
Local Journalism Initiative Reporter<\/em><\/p>\n\r\n\"Facebook\"<\/a>\"twitter\"<\/a>\"mail\"<\/a>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

For the last seven years, Avery Benlolo has devoted her spare time to making a difference in the lives of local women in need. Together with her sisters Lexi and Amanda, they founded the Pampered Pillowcase, an organization delivering items to brighten the lives of these women, regardless of their circumstances. In just a few […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":28936,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[4,5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-28934","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-general_news","category-news"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/03\/2021-03-11-06.jpg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p3D2k4-7wG","publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-04-18 08:20:03","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/28934","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=28934"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/28934\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/28936"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=28934"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=28934"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=28934"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}