Scholarships to help health care students

Jace Radke

Friday, Oct. 20, 2000 | 10:49 a.m.

For Shannon Malcolm a new $10,000 scholarship for UNLV's nursing program means she'll have more time for her kids.

The mother of two was among a group of six students to receive inaugural health sciences scholarships from the Harry and Rebecca Lahr Foundation.

"This scholarship will allow me to cut down to part-time in my job, and still support my family," Malcolm, a registered nurse at Sunrise Hospital and Medical Center, said.

The new scholarships, four for nursing students and two for radiography students, are expected to help graduate health care professionals into an industry desperate for help, Bill Scoble, a trustee of the foundation, said.

"Our hope is that this will get more people into these fields," Scoble said. "We're hoping that next year, if everything goes right, we'll be able to help about 20 students."

Thursday night a total of $40,000 in scholarships was awarded to six students, and trustee Nancy Scoble says that the amount could be as high as $200,000 next year.

Malcolm has been working her way through graduate school while working full-time as a nurse at Sunrise, but with the help of the new scholarship she now hopes to graduate in 2001 with a degree to become a family nurse practitioner.

The Lahrs were longtime Las Vegans, with Harry having sat on the board of directors of both the Bank of Las Vegas, later the Valley Bank, and Nevada National Bank. Rebecca Lahr, who helped establish the Sunrise Hospital Auxiliary Organization, asked the Scobles to manage the foundation.

"Rebecca really wanted us to do something with the foundation in the health care area," Bill Scoble said. "We leaned toward nursing because that had always been her baby with the auxiliary. It's really an honor and a privilege for us."