UKCOP Student Wins Nationally Competitive Scholarship
Kaylee Meador, a University of Kentucky College of Pharmacy student (PY1), has been named a recipient of the competitive $25,000 Chick-fil-A Remarkable Futures Scholarship. As one of 12 Chick-fil-A team members nationwide selected as a scholarship recipient, Meador has been invited to participate in the Chick-fil-A Scholars Program as a True Inspiration Scholar for the 2022-2023 school year.
The Chick-fil-A Scholars Program is a year-long leadership program that provides selected team members with the opportunity to travel and take courses that further develop personal leadership skills. This experience also helps positively impact individual participants and the future communities that they will serve after receiving a college education.
To complete the program, True Inspiration Scholars are required to participate in several educational activities to successfully develop strong leadership skills. These activities include monthly mentorship meetings; the Chick-fil-A Kickoff Event in Atlanta, Georgia; monthly participation in online group discussions focused on leadership development; a mid-year experiential learning trip; and the end-of-year closeout program.
The program is also unique because it invites participants to become members of the Chick-fil-A Scholarship Alumni Network after its conclusion. With 64 former scholars and new alumni joining annually, the group meets throughout the year to grow personally and professionally while serving others and reconnecting with friends made during the program.
In mid-March of 2022, Meador was flown to Atlanta under the impression that she was invited to attend a Chick-fil-A leadership conference. After arriving at the Chick-fil-A Support Center, the company surprised her and 11 other team members by gifting them with scholarships and MacBooks in the presence of their restaurant operators and other corporate employees.
Meador expressed excitement about receiving the scholarship and how it will further her education at UKCOP. “Through the Chick-fil-A Remarkable Futures Scholarship, I am able to work less hours and further focus on my extracurricular activities, such as serving as the ASHP-SSHP President of the Kentucky Alliance of Pharmacy,” said Meador. “I am also able to attend a future Shoulder-to-Shoulder Global Brigade in Ecuador, which I was unable to attend two years ago due to COVID-19. I can apply the leadership skills I learn through the Chick-fil-A Scholar Program to my pharmacy career so I can serve patients as an integral part of the interprofessional healthcare system.”
Meador also emphasized gratitude for the people and organizations that helped guide her throughout her educational and career journey. “I would like to thank Chick-fil-A and specifically my franchise operator, Mark Whiteman, for supporting my education,” said Meador. “Additionally, I would like to thank my colleagues at Baptist Health for fostering my devotion to pharmacy and encouraging my professional development.”
We wish to remember and honor those who inhabited this Commonwealth before the arrival of the Europeans. Briefly occupying these lands were the Osage, Wyndott tribe, and Miami peoples. The Adena and Hopewell peoples, who are recognized by the naming of the time period in which they resided here, were here more permanently. Some of their mounds remain in the Lexington area, including at UK’s Adena Park.
In more recent years, the Cherokee occupied southeast Kentucky, the Yuchi southwest Kentucky, the Chickasaw extreme western Kentucky and the Shawnee central Kentucky including what is now the city of Lexington. The Shawnee left when colonization pushed through the Appalachian Mountains. Lower Shawnee Town ceremonial grounds are still visible in Greenup County.
We honor the first inhabitants who were here, respect their culture, and acknowledge the presence of their descendants who are here today in all walks of life including fellow pharmacists and healthcare professionals.