Somewhere in Utah right now there’s a senior standing in a black box theater after everyone else has gone home, running a monologue one more time. Or a debater on a bus at 6 a.m. with a case file in their lap. They probably don’t think of what they’re doing as preparation for anything. It is.

We’ve already had the privilege of putting scholarship dollars in the hands of Utah students like that — kids who found something real in a speech room or on a stage and decided to carry it with them into college. Watching that happen is the entire reason this foundation exists.

Applications for the 2027 Gene C. McCombs Memorial Scholarship are now open.

Who Gene was

Gene C. McCombs spent thirty years teaching speech and theatrical arts. Ask anyone who sat in his classroom and you’ll hear some version of the same thing: he never treated the stage as something a student had to earn their way onto first.

No experience necessary. No particular background. No right kind of kid. If you were willing to stand up and try, that was the audition.

What he understood — and what a lot of people miss when they call these programs “extracurricular” — is that a speech room and a rehearsal hall teach things that are hard to teach anywhere else. Discipline, because a curtain goes up whether you’re ready or not. Creative thinking, because the script never quite covers the moment you’re actually in. And confidence, the ordinary kind, the kind that comes from having already done the terrifying thing once and survived it.

Those don’t stay in the theater. They follow a student into every room they ever walk into afterward.

This foundation exists to keep Gene’s door propped open for the students coming up behind him.

What the scholarship is

$6,000 total, awarded as three $2,000 scholarships.

To be eligible, you must be:

• A high school senior at a Utah public high school
• Involved in speech, debate, drama, or theatrical arts
• Planning to pursue a four-year degree
• Planning to stay involved in speech, debate, or theatrical arts in college

That last one matters to us. This isn’t a prize for a résumé line — it’s for students who aren’t finished with this work yet.

The essay

One essay, 400 to 600 words. We ask you to write about two things: how speech, debate, drama, or a related program has shaped your growth as a student and your satisfaction with your life — and how you plan to keep that going once you’re on a college campus.

A word of advice, since we read every one of these: we are not looking for the most polished writer in Utah. We’re looking for the honest answer. Tell us about the specific show, the specific round, the specific moment something changed. Small and true beats big and general every time.

Dates

Applications close April 9, 2027. Winners announced May 10, 2027.

Apply through the scholarship listing on Bold.org. There’s no fee to apply.

Teachers, parents, coaches

If you’re reading this and a student’s name just came to mind — please send this to them.

The kids who most deserve this award are frequently the last to think they qualify for it. A forwarded link from a teacher they trust does more than any post we could write.

If you’d like to fund one

Every dollar donated to the scholarship fund goes to a student. Not a percentage of it — all of it. No administrative cut, no processing fees taken out by us.

Two thousand dollars is a semester of textbooks and a little breathing room for a kid whose parents are already stretched. If you’d like to help us fund the next round, you can give here.

To the seniors: we’re looking forward to reading what you send us.