Trinity senior, Estella Frausto, a geoscience major and a music minor who grew up near San Antonio in Atascosa, Texas, has been selected to receive the UPS Scholarship for 2020-2021.
Frausto is involved in many different organizations on campus including being a historian for the Trinity University Geoscience club and she is in the Trinity University orchestra. Using her liberal arts education, Frausto is able to combine many of her interests which include music, geoscience, and entrepreneurship.
One of her biggest achievements at Trinity was making it to the finals in the Stumberg Venture competition. With the funding she was awarded from the competition she was able to open Mariachi Mercado. Frausto says, “Due to my financial situation I would have never been able to even dream about getting my venture off the ground, but with the generous donations from the Stumberg family and the guidance of my mentors in the VMS program (Venture Mentoring Service) I was able to turn my idea into a business.” The end goal for her venture is to provide support for mariachi performers throughout San Antonio and surrounding areas. Mariachi Mercado offers full booking services to performers and hopes to provide scholarship opportunities for performers looking to continue their education.
To Frausto being a leader means making difficult decisions. As a business owner, she is used to making big decisions for her company. As a young business owner of Mariachi Mercado, she has become a leader in the San Antonio community. After graduation, she plans to continue working on her venture by staying in San Antonio and continue being connected to the Trinity community. Winning this scholarship is meaningful to Frausto because it not only recognizes her for her leadership abilities but also acts as financial relief. Frausto said, “Every semester there comes a point where I become overwhelmed with trying to figure out how to pay my tuition while trying to maintain my grades. Winning this scholarship has relieved a lot of stress and is allowing me to continue my education with a lot less worry regarding my finances”.
The UPS scholarship is provided by the Independent Colleges and Universities of Texas (ICUT) Foundation and its national partner, the Council of Independent Colleges (CIC). Through this program, the ICUT Foundation has awarded $170,250 in UPS Scholarships to 39 students at private institutions across Texas. The CIC is an association of more than 700 nonprofit independent colleges and universities and higher education affiliates and organizations that has worked since 1956 to support college and university leadership, advance institutional excellence, and enhance public understanding of private higher education’s contributions to society. CIC is the major national organization focused on providing services to leaders of independent colleges and universities, as well as conferences, seminars, and other programs that help institutions improve educational quality, administrative and financial performance, and institutional visibility.
You might be interested in
