The Kiwanis Children’s Fund honors eight Key Club and CKI scholars.

By Erin Chandler

The eight outstanding students who received this year’s Kiwanis Children’s Fund scholarships are not afraid to listen, speak up, innovate and improve the way their clubs and organizations work. As a result, each is leaving their club better than they found it — with new projects and systems that make Key Club and Circle K International (CKI) better, both for members and the communities they serve. Each recipient says that, as they move forward in life, they will take the values and skills they’ve learned in Key Club and CKI with them, informing how they show up and make a difference in business, healthcare, science, law and politics, philanthropy and community service. 

The Children’s Fund is honored to help them continue their education in the upcoming academic year. 

Layla Hurley
Linda Canaday Memorial Scholarship
Layla Hurley recently graduated from Penn High School in Mishawaka, Indiana, U.S., where she served as president of the school’s Key Club. Of her four years in Key Club, Hurley says, “Recognizing what we could achieve together pushed me to reflect on the kind of community I wanted to help build and the role I can play in strengthening it.” She created a new system to organize the club’s information and service opportunities, and she played a key role in service projects focusing on suicide prevention, children in foster care, people experiencing homelessness, people in assisted living, and accessibility for children with autism. Hurley also took leadership roles in the United Nations International Children’s Emergency Fund Club, Around the World in 180 Days and DECA, and she was the founder of the school’s Economics and Finance Club. She is a dedicated athlete who competed on the girls’ cross country and intramural volleyball teams, was captain of the girls’ track and field team, and founded the intramural spikeball team. Hurley plans to attend Indiana University Bloomington, U.S., where she will pursue a career in business with the goal of strengthening her future communities. 

Kaleb Tieu
Wagner Family Scholarship
Kaleb Tieu, a recent graduate of La Quinta High School in Fountain Valley, California, U.S., was recovering from a concussion and Long COVID when he joined his school’s KIWIN’S club. “I was in a wheelchair — cut off from my sport, friends and the version of myself I recognized,” Tieu says. “Still, I wanted community.” Through membership, he “saw how KIWIN’S inclusiveness wasn’t a tagline; it was real. Once I found that belonging, I wanted to pass it on.” As he moved through four years of KIWIN’S — serving as freshman representative, club treasurer, district sponsorship chair and finally governor of the California-Nevada-Hawaii District — Tieu passed on his sense of community by forming a club mentorship system, helping develop a pilot fundraising platform, raising a record-breaking US$26,000 to help others attend the district convention, increasing club membership by 39% and focusing on chartering new clubs. He also held officer positions in HOSA-Future Health Professionals, math club, National Honor Society, School Site Council and Garden Grove Unified School District Senate. Outside of school, Tieu mentored fifth-graders as a youth basketball coach. He is a part-time certified nursing assistant at a nursing home and part-time medical assistant at an OB-GYN clinic. Tieu plans to pursue a career in medicine at the University of California Los Angeles (UCLA), U.S. 

Maya Aminova
Kiwanis Children’s Fund Scholarship
Maya Aminova is a recent graduate of Taunton High School, Massachusetts, U.S. Aminova’s first leadership role in the Taunton High School Key Club was as publicity coordinator; from there, she went on to serve Key Club International as a trustee and as editor. These roles called her to document and highlight stories, first from her home club, then from clubs around the world. “I focused on moments that reflected care: paint-stained hands making cards for seniors, laughter during long shifts distributing winter clothing. I learned that caring is consistent attention to people and purpose.” Aminova shows care most as a mentor who inspires her fellow students. She was an after-school math instructor with Mathnasium, an assistant eighth-grade algebra teacher at Taunton High School, a bilingual math tutor at the Russian School of Mathematics, a mentor to middle school clarinetists and an assistant dance teacher at On the Barre Dance Studio. She also held leadership positions on the Taunton High School band council, math team and clarinet choir, and is a competitive dancer. Aminova already has assisted in neuroscience research at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and in developing improved surgical tools with Johnson & Johnson MedTech. She will study public health at Yale University, Connecticut, U.S. 

Samantha Orr
Kiwanis Children’s Fund Scholarship
Samantha Orr recently graduated from Voorhees High School in Glen Gardner, New Jersey, U.S. Her family has a history of Key Club membership, but when Orr joined, she saw the need for changes in her club. As a Key Club member, treasurer and president, she worked to improve her club’s organization and reorient its focus to more sustained and impactful service projects — including the Giving Tree program that supports members of the community during the holiday season. Orr even led her club to join in service projects with its sponsoring Kiwanis club. Orr says Key Club “drastically changed the way I view myself and my goals in life,” and she hopes to bring its “service-based mindset” into the next stages of her life. In addition to Key Club, she had leadership roles in the Or Chadash Temple Youth Group, as well as her school’s drama club, Hebrew Culture Club and Relay for Life club. (She even helped found the latter two.) Orr was a lead youth soloist in the Or Chadash Temple Choir and a stage manager in both her school’s theatre program and the Unified Theater. In the upcoming school year, Orr will study biomedical sciences at the University at Buffalo, New York, U.S. 

Ananya Bommineni
CKI Past Presidents Scholarship
Ananya Bommineni is the current president of the Circle K International Club of the University of Michigan Ann Arbor, U.S., and treasurer of the Michigan District. She also has served as Michigan District governor and on several committees at the club and district levels. Since joining CKI as a freshman, Bommineni has worked to increase accessibility and engagement in her home club, shifting focus to more impactful service activities, creating incentives for attendance and participation, strengthening relations with the sponsoring Kiwanis club and working with Kiwanis to reduce membership costs. “What CKI taught me,” she says, “is how to be a leader: to listen before acting, to center the needs of the people you serve and to design systems that enable others to contribute.” She says these lessons have changed her approach to her other activities — including her volunteer service with Ann Arbor Public Schools and as a staff reporter for the university newspaper — and to her future career in healthcare. Bommineni is majoring in biopsychology, cognition and neuroscience, and she is DEI chair of the Mu Epsilon Delta professional pre-health organization. She has also volunteered in the Michigan Medicine Child and Adolescent Psych Unit and worked for a year as a nurse technician in a hospital pediatrics unit. 

Alilah Mora De Jesus
John E. Mayfield CKI Scholarship
Alilah Mora De Jesus is the current president of the Circle K International Club of Chaffey College, California, U.S., where she studies political science, law and public policy. De Jesus was one of the club’s founding members and quickly discovered her voice as its vice president, taking on additional leadership roles as the media and marketing director of the Moonlight Division, California-Nevada-Hawaii District communication specialist, and chair of the district’s Service and OnTo International Convention committees. She led her club’s growth from eight to 44 members in less than a year, helped create a toolkit of district service opportunities, launched a club mentorship program and organized Go West, CKI’s marathon event to decorate the Kiwanis International float for the Rose Parade. Of her time in CKI, she says, “I realized I had grown into a leader who doesn’t just speak, but creates spaces where others discover confidence and purpose.” Outside of CKI, De Jesus was the founding president of the Chaffey College Model United Nations and served as a senator in the Chaffey College student government. She is a cultural dance instructor and performer with the Philippine American Cultural School, a volunteer veterinary assistant and a competitive weightlifter — all while maintaining multiple part-time jobs. 

Sarah Nguyen
Kiwanis Children’s Fund Scholarship
Sarah Nguyen, a biology major at Chaffey College, California, U.S., founded the Circle K International Club of Chaffey College in her freshman year. She quickly became inspired by the shared purpose and intergenerational bonds she found within the Kiwanis family. “When I first joined CKI,” she says, “I believed leadership was being the loudest voice in the room and service was a contractual obligation. My time in CKI challenged those ideas and reformed me into the compassionate leader I am today.” Nguyen served on numerous CKI California-Nevada-Hawaii District committees during her term as club president, including as District Convention Entertainment Committee chair, before becoming lieutenant governor of the Moonlight Division. She was also cochair of the Go West event, which brings CKI members together over a number of days to decorate the Kiwanis float for the Rose Parade. Outside of CKI, Nguyen holds officer positions in the Chaffey College student government, Pre-Med Society, and Fashion and Interior Design Club. She volunteers at the Community Hospital of San Bernardino. 

Kayla Docteur
Kiwanis Children’s Fund Scholarship
Kayla Docteur is a public relations major and the current president of the Circle K International Club of the University of Florida, U.S. Docteur previously served as her club’s recruitment chair and vice president. Under her leadership, the club has organized 122 service events, including a “Trick-or-Treat” donation drive that assembled over 60 volunteers to collect nearly 2,500 pounds of food and supplies for people experiencing homelessness. “While it feels amazing to work with people hands-on and see the impact I make in real time,” Docteur says, “I think the real reward of volunteer work is knowing that you will touch a life in ways you can’t begin to imagine.” Outside of CKI, Docteur is the current copresident of the Black Public Relations Student Society, and she works part-time as a writer in the marketing and communication services department at the University of Florida’s Warrington College of Business. She hopes to take her passion for community service into a public relations role in a large corporation’s philanthropic or social responsibility efforts. 

Learn more about scholarship opportunities from the Kiwanis Children’s Fund, including award notification dates and who to contact with questions.