The Zonta Club of Milwaukee awards funds from Zonta Foundation, Inc. through three scholarship programs each year. The Young Women in Public Affairs award and Jane M. Klausman Women in Business scholarship are both tri-level programs, with awards at the local, district and international levels. The Women in STEM scholarship is awarded only at the local level.

Young Women in Public Affairs – Abigail Warwick 

The Zonta Club of Milwaukee received 15 applications for the 2018 Young Women in Public Affairs Award. Our recipient was Abigail Warwick, a senior graduating from Muskego High School and planning to major in Civil and Environmental Engineering at University of Wisconsin – Madison.

Abigail is committed to using engineering to positively impact the world. She spent all four years of high school on the stu

dent council, including her senior year as executive board treasurer. The summer before her junior year, she participated in the Badger Girls State Leadership Conference, where hundreds of young women from all parts of Wisconsin gather to learn about government and leadership. She has also participated in Hugh O’Brian’s Youth Leadership Conference, was a member of several honor societies at her school, and volunteers for the Special Olympics.

In college, she plans to participate in service-based community projects organized by Students Today Leaders Forever. As noted by the head faculty advisor of the high school student council, “Abby is proof that our future is in good hands.”

Women in STEM – Elizabeth Pieroni 

In June 2018, the Zonta Club of Milwaukee received five applications for the Women in STEM scholarship and selected Chemistry major Elizabeth Pieroni as the recipient.

Preparing to embark on her senior year at Carthage College at the time of her application,
Elizabeth has been a consistent member of the Dean’s List and a member of the Chemistry Club, Student Engineers Club, Theta Chi Delta Chemistry Honors Fraternity, and Alpha Lambda Delta Honors Fraternity. She is a member of the college’s Swim & Dive Team and serves as a swim coach at a YMCA.

Elizabeth is also working with a Carthage professor as a researcher on a National Science Foundation grant to study surfactants using a nuclear magnetic resonance spectrometer. One of her professors noted that Elizabeth was inspired in her career direction by her grandmother, who was a biochemistry researcher. He sees for Elizabeth a bright future as a scientist.

Elizabeth explained her goals in her application as such:
“While at this time I am unsure of my exact career path, I know that my ultimate professional goal is to make a difference in the world, to feel as though I have done my best to contribute to the greater good.… I hope to be able to narrow down my path to topics like green chemistry to improve our environment, or biochemistry to improve chemical applications in the medical field. These topics have a significance to my life which would make the research in these fields more meaningful and worthwhile. However, there is more to chemistry than just the scientific knowledge. It is a difficult field and requires persistence and years of hard work which are qualities that expand further in life than just the act of landing a job, they lead to the improvement of oneself as an individual.”

Jane M. Klausman Women in Business

The club did not receive any applications for the Jane M. Klausman Women in Business scholarship in 2018. The Scholarship Committee is exploring ways to increase awareness of the scholarship and encourage applications.