Meet the 2025 DeSales Leadership Scholars

Six first-year students have received the DeSales University Leadership Scholarship, a full-tuition award honoring applicants who excelled as high school leaders and are ready to build on that foundation at DeSales.

Each year, incoming first-year students are able to apply for this scholarship by writing a brief essay describing their character and leadership experience through the lens of one of the five Salesian values: Gentleness, Humility, Gratitude, Hospitality, and Wisdom. A committee made up of student life staff then interviews scholarship finalists and selects the award recipients.

"These scholarships seek to welcome strong, balanced students who can stand before our University community as exemplars of our core values. We hope that their embrace of gentleness, humility, gratitude, hospitality, and wisdom will inform their lives and inspire others to integrate the essence of a Catholic, Salesian higher education into futures whose trajectories can champion the best of our mission,” shared Vice President of Mission Fr. Kevin Nadolski, OSFS, Ph.D.

The 2025 Leadership Scholarship recipients are:

• Jaiden Byelich, an exploratory studies major in the College of Arts, Education, and Humanities;
• Daniel “Danny” Carrol, a theatre major pursuing the musical theatre performance track in the School of Performing Arts;
• Michael “Bryan” Garza, a sports and exercise physiology major pursuing the strength and conditioning track in the College of Sciences;
• Mary Mulderig, a business administration major in the Waterbury Reilly School of Business;
• Ethan Scott, a psychology major in the College of Sciences; and
• Amanda Yu, a nursing major within the Nurse Scholars Program in the School of Nursing.

High school students wishing to learn more about scholarship eligibility and the application process may visit DSU Grants & Scholarships.