OCEANO — The Oceano/Five Cities Elks Lodge 2504 handed out $24,000 worth of scholarships to seniors from local high schools.
During an awards dinner Wednesday, students from four different high schools were awarded scholarships.
Jared Aguilera is a senior at Nipomo High School and was awarded the Student of the Year and the Altrusa International of SLO scholarships.
In the fall, he is heading to UC Irvine with the dream of becoming a doctor.
He told KSBY he was inspired by a friend who passed away from cancer two years ago.
"She would always talk to me about how well doctors were treating her and how much or how big of an impact doctors were making in her life," Aguilera said. "So that ultimately inspired me to want to go into the medical field and be able to make an impact on kids like her."
Scholarship chairman Sean Pringle said the scholarships are just one of the ways the Oceano/Five Cities Elks Lodge supports the community.
"It means the world to us to be able to recognize our youth, especially these incredible youth that we have that are going off to do many amazing things," Pringle said.
