OTEC announces Trade & Lineman School Scholarship recipients

By Shannon Weidemann (McKone) on Thursday, March 25th, 2021 in Eastern/Southeast Oregon News More Top Stories

BAKER CITY – (Release from OTECC) Oregon Trail Electric Cooperative is proud to announce that five local students have earned scholarships to attend either a trade school or lineman school.

Aidan Patton of Imbler and Nolan Scheen of Burns were recently each awarded a $5,000 OTEC scholarship to pursue a career as a lineman.

Katie Hire of John Day, Jacob Swindlehurst of Burns and Riley Youngblood of North Powder were each awarded a $2,500 OTEC scholarship to attend trade school.

“We are pleased to award these scholarships to help support these students as they pursue their career paths and gain the valuable skills needed for in-demand jobs in the trades or in the electric utility industry”, said Joe Hathaway, Communications Manager at OTEC. “Member-owned cooperatives like OTEC are, by their very nature, community partners and we have always been proud to support the educational goals of local students and give back to the communities in our service territory.”

Scholarship winners are selected from a pool of candidates from OTEC’s service territory in Baker, Grant, Harney, and Union Counties. Scholarship funds come from unclaimed capital credits.

“We encourage all OTEC members, regardless of age, who want to pursue a trade or attend lineman school to apply for our scholarships.” said Hathaway. “Lineman schools and trade schools provide excellent opportunities for those who don’t want to pursue college, but want to learn marketable skills, work in an interesting living-wage job and carry little or no student debt.”

Applications for both trade and lineman school scholarships are open year-round. You can apply at www.otec.coop/scholarships.

OTEC’s 2021 academic scholarship recipients will be announced this spring.

About the cooperative

Oregon Trail Electric Cooperative (OTEC) is a not-for-profit, member-owned electric cooperative that serves over 60,000 residents in four counties in Eastern Oregon. Headquartered in Baker City, OTEC has district offices in Burns, John Day and La Grande.