Morghan Williams, a Richmond Community High School graduate who is a first-year student at North Carolina A&T, is one of 25 students in the United States to be awarded $10,000 through the Sallie Mae Fund’s Bridging the Dream Scholarships for High School Seniors.

The scholarship is offered in partnership with the Thurgood Marshall College Fund, and Ms. Williams competed with more than 1,000 applicants in the selection process.

When Ms. Williams received an email notifying her that she was one of the winners, she suspected it might be a SPAM message. She decided to respond and see what happened.

“I had talked about it to my mom, teachers, counselors — just about everybody,” she told the Richmond Free Press over the phone, after an hours-long study session with classmates.

The responding email made it clear that the message was legitimate and she would be a recipient.

“This scholarship was the last one I needed to be able to attend my first year of college without getting into debt,” Ms. Williams said.

As a dual-enrollment graduate in Community High School’s Class of 2022, she earned enough college credits as a high school student to enroll in her first year as a sophomore instead of a freshman.

Ms. Williams said she learned about the scholarship through Partnership for the Future, a program that works with college-bound high school students with limited resources, connecting them with college preparatory courses, personal development workshops, one-on-one counseling, and college savings plan information.

Antoine Oakley, the director of government and community relations for education lender Sallie Mae, said Bridging the Dream Scholarships have existed since 2014, but after George Floyd’s death, the company wanted to demonstrate a commitment to helping low-income students of color who have limited resources.

“Sallie Mae Fund’s goals have always been helping students and families achieve the dream of a higher education,” he said. “We upped our game by wanting to help them through college and immediately after.”

In 2020, Sallie Mae committed $4.5 million of funding over three years with a focus on “advancing social justice through education,” Mr. Oakley said. Of those funds, $3 million will go to scholarships that directly benefit students, and $1.5 million will go to nonprofits providing programs to help students achieve their higher education goals. To date, Mr. Oakley said 53 scholarships totaling $500,000 in funding have been awarded to students.

As one of those recipients, Ms. Williams is focused on her career goals. She is studying kinesiology at N.C. A&T and plans to be a physical therapist for children with disabilities after earning her doctorate. Her desire to go into the field is inspired by her younger brother, who was diagnosed with autism two years ago. He is now 3 years old, and Ms. Williams said she helped him learn to play basketball and soccer.

The scholarship is open to high school seniors from underserved communities who are Pell-grant eligible and have a 2.75 grade point average.Applicants are required to submit a video answering a question provided by the scholarship. Applications for the next round of scholarships will be available in January.