“It can completely change someone’s life to get a scholarship,” says Ashley Johnson, Carlson School class of 2008. That’s something she knows first hand. Left parentless at age 16, Ashley worried about financing her education. “After my initial grief,” she says, “I began to fear for my future. How would I pay for college on my own?”

Luckily, she didn’t have to. Ashley was the 2004 recipient of the Carlson School Achievement Award, established by Andrew Cerece, ‘91 MBA, and his wife Kathleen. The freshman scholarship based on merit, grades, accomplishments, and community service helped assure her education. Ashley also received other scholarships from the Carlson School, the University of Minnesota, her high school, benefactors in her home state of Wisconsin, and other philanthropies.

Cancer had taken her mother’s life when Ashley was only 14 months old. Then, during her junior year in high school, the disease threatened her father’s life. She missed weeks of school to nurse him, collecting her homework every day and even attending a few pre-calculus classes. When he died, she was devastated. Even so, her high school records were outstanding: she graduated with a 4.0 GPA and ranked seventh in her class.

Now, at the start of her junior year, Ashley talks with excitement of the term she spent in London, her summer internship, and her boyfriend, whom she met during last year’s summer internship. She’s fully engaged in college life, just as she hoped she would be when she came to the Carlson School two years ago. She also maintains a 3.85 GPA and is developing a major that blends marketing and psychology. Her education is still being supported by a scholarship: this year, Ashley is a recipient of the Goldman Scholarship.