Kenan Excellence Award winners, 2006 & 2007
L-R: Kaitlin Bodfish (2006); Thomas S. Kenan, III, Trustee, William R. Kenan, Jr. Charitable Trust; Brooke Robbins (2007); Alex Moratto (2006); Whitney Oppenheimer (2007); Vanessa Hernandez (2006); Dr. Richard Krasno, Executive Director, William R. Kenan, Jr. Charitable Trust; Veronica Herbert (2007); Joshua Conyers (2006); Justin Melvin (2006); John Mauceri, Chancellor, North Carolina School of the Arts; Valerie Walz (2007); Braxton Molinaro (2007)

Dr. Richard M. Krasno, executive director of the Trust, said: “The William R. Kenan, Jr. Charitable Trust established this new scholarship program to demonstrate our confidence in the exceptional educational experience the North Carolina School of the Arts provides to talented student-artists from around the world. It is our hope that this grant will stimulate others to join us by providing similar scholarship support for very talented students who wish to attend NCSA.”

The Kenan Excellence Awards were first presented in 2006-07. The Kenan Trust grant will provide a total of 20 students with full scholarships over a seven-year period. Awards are renewable for up to four years as long as the student continues in good standing.

Criteria for the scholarship awards include the students’ abilities in their arts discipline, grade point average, SAT or ACT test scores, capacity to lead and motivate, and extracurricular achievement.  A review committee establishes a list of semifinalists, who are interviewed for selection as finalists. Awards are made to students judged to have the best potential as artist-scholars regardless of the program in which they enroll or their state of residence. 

The award recipients for 2007-08 are:

• Veronica Herbert, Youngstown, Ohio

Herbert is a graduate of Ursuline High School, where she was ranked No. 1 (of 132) in her class and was named a National Merit Semifinalist and an AP Scholar. She attended the NCSA School of Filmmaking 2006 Summer Session before applying as a regular student. David Elkins, then serving as interim film dean, noted in her nomination for the Kenan Excellence Award that she had the highest SAT scores of any candidate interviewed for the School of Filmmaking.

Herbert’s teacher recommendations included: “She is among the best students I have encountered in my teaching career,” and  “(She) is a gifted storyteller. I can only imagine the films in her future will be lively, intelligent, and carefully crafted, just as she strives to do with her fiction, both the stories she writes for courses and those she creates on her own time.”

• Braxton James Molinaro, Pleasant Prairie, Wisc.

Molinaro is a graduate of Mary D. Bradford High School of Kenosha, Wisc., where he played the title role in “Sweeney Todd, the Demon Barber of Fleet Street” in his senior year. This past summer, he performed the role of Trevor Graydon in “Thoroughly Modern Millie” at the opening of the International Thespian Festival in Lincoln, Neb.   

At Bradford High, he was actively involved in drama productions and A Cappella Choir (top choir) and Madrigal Singers for his entire high school career. In 2005, he performed the role of Radames in Bradford’s production of “Aida: Student Edition,” which was a premiere of the student edition for Music Theatre International and Disney Theatrical.

One teacher recommendation said: “He spent his last two summers directing two musicals in our Kenosha community… . The money he raised was donated to charity. In my 24 years of music and theatre teaching in the public schools, I have never worked with a young person who is this courageous. Creating a $20,000 budget and directing a production with complex values when you are 16 years old is new in my experience as an educator.”

• Whitney Hope Oppenheimer, Plantation, Fla.

Oppenheimer is a graduate of South Plantation High School. She began drawing costumes while an elementary school student. As she progressed in school, she developed an interest in history and cultures, theatre and movies, and decided costume design could include all of her interests.

Joseph Tilford, dean of NCSA’s School of Design and Production, commented: “Her portfolio is remarkable and shows clear artistic ability, a highly developed costume design talent and an advanced worth ethic.” This is especially impressive since she is completely self-taught. He notes it is very rare to find talent such as hers even with formal training and added “she is an intellectually gifted student who welcomes challenge.” 

A recipient of the 2006-07 AP Scholar Award with Honors, Oppenheimer had leadership roles in her high school, including serving as president of the Drama Club. She used her school’s costume holdings, which she supervised, to loan job interview outfits and prom dresses to students in-need. She also was involved in Caring for Kids and Critters, a wildlife care center.

• Brooke Robbins, Charlotte, N.C. 

A 2007 graduate of the NCSA Visual Arts Program, Robbins attended the Northwest School of the Arts in Charlotte from 2003-05. She is in the scene design program at the NCSA School of Design and Production. 

In her nomination, Joseph Tilford, dean of the School of Design and Production, said: “I have never seen a student who was better prepared for entry into a rigorous, demanding BFA design program.”

Robbins was honored with the North Carolina Scholastic Foundation Regional Award and the Scholastic Gold Key Award. She also has been honored with membership in the National Arts Honors Society.

In her personal statement, Ms. Robbins wrote: “When I was a kid I was elated when we bought a new refrigerator because I wanted its box so badly. I took the enormous cardboard box and made it into anything I wanted. I made it into a rocket and flew to the moon; I made it into a car and took long rides to faraway places. … Now I want to create worlds for an entire audience to travel to. I want to see my thoughts translated to paper and then translated to 40-foot spaces.”

• Valerie Walz, Orlando, Fla.

Walz is a graduate of Dr. Phillips High School in the Theatre Strand of the Visual and Performing Arts magnet program. She was a member of the National Honor Society and has been on the Principal’s Honor Roll since 2003. One of her teachers said Walz “is a student whose appreciation of learning, coupled with an intense focus and total commitment to excellence, makes her a joy to work with in and out of the classroom.”

Walz volunteers in the community, working with Relay for Life and the Dr. Phillips Rotary Club.  Her work with the Rotary Club impressed community leaders so much that they contributed $10,000 to the school’s theatre program to help finance a trip to the Edinburgh Festival in Scotland.

The NCSA Lighting Design faculty’s review of her work said: “After 15 years of reviewing the portfolios of prospective undergraduates, it would not be an exaggeration to say that hers was one of the best in all of that time. She displayed … a rare and excellent ability to analyze a script in both intellectual and emotional contexts.”

The William R. Kenan, Jr. Charitable Trust was established in 1965 from the estate of William Rand Kenan, Jr., who was born in Wilmington in 1872 and graduated from UNC in 1894. Kenan was a scientist, chemical and mechanical engineer, business executive, dairy farmer and philanthropist.   

The Kenan family has a long history of support for the North Carolina School of the Arts. Thomas S. Kenan III, of Chapel Hill, for whom the Thomas S. Kenan Institute for the Arts at NCSA is named, is an honorary member of the School’s Board of Trustees, a member of its Board of Visitors, and is a founder of NCSA.

The North Carolina School of the Arts was the first state-supported, residential school of its kind in the nation. Established by the N.C. General Assembly in 1963, NCSA opened in Winston-Salem in 1965 and became a part of the University of North Carolina in 1972.  More than 1,100 students from middle school through graduate school train for careers in the arts in five professional schools:  Dance, Design and Production (including a Visual Arts Program), Drama, Filmmaking, and Music.  For more information about NCSA, visit www.ncarts.edu.

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