Lauren Hanley Scholarship Fund - El Sobrante Chamber of Commerce

Lauren Hanley

Presented by the El Sobrante Chamber of Commerce

Lauren Marie Hanley—May 20, 1986—August 27, 2020
Lauren was elected to the board of directors in 2019. In 2020, Lauren was elected to President of the Board. She was the Web Design & Marketing Director at Nerd Crossing and owner of Lauren Hanley Productions.

Prior to becoming a Nerd, Lauren’s resume included:

Social Media Manager for FlockTAG in Detrioit – FlockTAG is a customer loyalty card-type company
Retention Marketing & Customer Service Manager for Koolbit in San Francisco, an electronic gaming company
Advertising & Marketing SidePeep for Sidecar in San Francisco – a media company
Content Producer for Inhale Digital, electronic marketing company in San Francisco
Production Supervisor for Morris Visitor Publications in Honolulu – publisher of visitor guides and promotional materials
Office manager at UP Magazine in New York
Lauren was also a writer, freelancing for several companies writing stories, marketing materials and reviews.
She was also a playwright, having written plays for an award-winning nonprofit production company in Hawaii which were published or produced.

Lauren was also a dog lover, and an eager volunteer in the community on projects involving beautification of the downtown, promoting the local businesses and especially in supporting the Chamber Scholarship Committee.

In 2021 the Board elected to rename the Scholarship fund in her memory, and include her interests as part of the criteria on the application.

Scholarship title

The El Sobrante Chamber of Commerce Scholarship Fund was established to support graduating high school seniors living in or going to school in the 94803 zip code who plan to continue their education by attending a community college after graduation.

Originally organized by chamber member Joe Saccheri of Joe’s Pizza (now Four Corners Pizza) as “Brain Food” in 2000 , the chamber raised funds from a community dinner and later awarded scholarships to applicants from the high school.

When Joe retired the fundraising took a hiatus from events and relied more on “add on“ donations from memberships. In 2017 the chamber re-energized the scholarship program and began awarding scholarships again.

Applications are received in the spring from hopeful graduating seniors.

The applicants are required to present their academic accomplishments as well as an essay on various topics, for example, the applicants experience in community service, or overcoming a challenge or other topics. Selection of a scholarship recipient is by a committee made up of board members from the Chamber.

While financial need is not an expressed consideration in qualifying an applicant, it is recognized that the young scholars applying are continuing their education at the junior college level and may not have the resources at hand to begin a four year college journey.

Awards range in number and amount, but typically fall around $500 per recipient—the number of scholarships awarded dependant upon both the number of applications received and the balance of the fund in a given cycle.

Thank you for your generous contribution to the fund. Your actions will make a difference.

Download the Scholarship application form.