Mayor Dominick Pangallo announces that the City of Salem, in partnership with Waste Management, have awarded the winners of the 2025 City of Salem and Waste Management Scholarship, and would like to thank this year鈥檚 participants for their submissions. Each year, the program offers scholarships to Salem students pursuing a college or graduate level program focused on environmental sustainability.
Winners Kate Heppner and Vihanna Frias were awarded $2,500, while runner-up Alex Pappas received $1,000, for essays on how Salem can be a more sustainable city.
Kate Heppner鈥檚 essay focused on the outsized electricity consumption at Salem High School and highlighted the potential of solar tube lighting and occupancy sensors as a low cost and maintenance-friendly way to increase energy efficiency on the new campus. Heppner will be attending the University of Vermont in the Fall with plans to major in Environmental Studies.
Vihanna Frias will be attending UMass Boston this Fall. Her essay addressed a wide range of topics, including supporting Salem鈥檚 community farms and gardens, public transportation, solar energy, and green jobs, while ensuring the wider community is directly engaged in sustainability efforts.
Alex Pappas is a Salem resident and is currently a student at Salem State University, majoring in Geography with a Concentration in Environmental Sustainability. In her essay, Pappas focused on improving outdoor infrastructure to promote engagement with green spaces and advocated for scientific and media literacy to gain support for meaningful environmental initiatives.