Eleven annual scholarships, named to honor Arizona
native Cesar Chavez, will promote academic success
The Tostitos brand has announced creation of the Tostitos Cesar Chavez Latino Scholarship Fund to benefit Latino students across the state of Arizona. Administered in partnership with the Cesar Chavez Foundation, the fund will provide $500,000 over the next five years to qualified Latino students in Arizona in an effort to promote academic success.
The fund will support 11 scholarships awarded annually by Tostitos and the Chavez foundation. Scholarships will be granted based on academic excellence, leadership in extra-curricular activities, commitment to volunteer service in the community and financial need.
"We are so proud to partner with the Cesar Chavez Foundation to recognize Arizona’s Latino youth through the creation of the Tostitos Cesar Chavez Latino Scholarship Fund," said Justin Lambeth, vice president of marketing for Frito-Lay North America. "The Tostitos brand is all about helping people make connections. Through this scholarship fund, we’re helping create one of the most meaningful connections possible for Latino students throughout Arizona: the chance to continue their educations and fulfill their dreams."
“At a time of heightening ethnic and racial tensions, these scholarships will recognize deserving young Latino students who are continuing Cesar Chavez’s legacy of self-sacrifice, diversity, community service and championing equality and respect for all human beings, no matter who they are or where they come from,” said Paul Chavez, Cesar Chavez’s middle son and president and CEO of the Chavez foundation.
The 2011 Tostitos Cesar Chavez Latino Scholarship Fund program will be featured during the annual Si Se Puede Gala organized in Phoenix around Chavez’s March 31 birthday. Presented by the Chavez foundation, the gala honors the values, traditions and legacy of the legendary farm labor and civil rights leader who was born on his family’s homestead in the North Gila River Valley near Yuma, Ariz. in 1927.
Upon receipt of their awards, scholarship recipients will be asked to complete 30 hours of service to the PepsiCo/Frito-Lay Adelante Employee Group. Adelante, which celebrates its 10th anniversary this year, is Frito-Lay’s employee resource group that works across the company’s many locations and business functions to create a more inclusive corporate culture and support the many diverse communities in which Frito-Lay operates.
Tostitos is one of the many brands that make up Frito-Lay North America, the $13 billion convenient foods business unit of PepsiCo headquartered in Purchase, New York. In addition to Frito-Lay, PepsiCo business units include Pepsi-Cola, Quaker Foods, Gatorade and Tropicana. Learn more about Frito-Lay at the corporate Web site, http://www.fritolay.com/, the Snack Chat blog, http://www.snacks.com/ and on Twitter at http://www.twitter.com/fritolay.
The Cesar Chavez Foundation, a (501(c)(3) non-profit charitable organization, was founded by the Chavez family in the wake of Chavez’s passing in 1993, to maximize human potential and improve communities by preserving, promoting and applying Chavez’s legacy and universal values. Learn more about the Chavez foundation at its Web site, http://www.chavezfoundation.org/