AUBURN — Rarely has a candidate for the $5,000 Don Gay Scholarship met the scholarship’s criteria as fully as its 2016 recipient, Riley McCurdy.

Her outstanding achievements during her four years at Edward Little High School — in academics, music and drama — rank her among the top of the 13 winning candidates since 2002.

The scholarship, named in honor of Auburn’s public school music director from 1944 to 1959, requires that an Edward Little senior has made outstanding contributions to the high school’s arts programs — primarily music and drama — over his or her four years of study.

Ranked seventh of 198 seniors, McCurdy took no less than 15 honors or advanced placement classes while a student at Edward Little. Despite that workload, she was president of the National Honor Society and served as secretary, vice president and president of the Speech and Debate team and in the same offices for the Drama Club. She was also president of the Tri-M Music Honor Society.

McCurdy was a four-year varsity tennis player and captain her junior year. She was a member of the Edward Little executive board for four years serving as president during her freshman year and as vice president while she was a sophomore.

“Two different musical opportunities that have perhaps been the most influential in my future career plans,” McCurdy said. “I spent two summers volunteering at Lewiston-Auburn Community Little Theatre in Auburn as a camp counselor for the Youth Summer Theater Program.

“What I learned from my experience with the children was that I love children,” she said. “The second experience is as a voice teacher for two children in a neighboring town. I have learned to put into practice many of the strategies and techniques I have learned as a voice student in high school.”

Last fall, McCurdy was accepted as a student into the Bates College High School Senior Scholars program and recently finished a two-week intensive music program at the Ithaca Summer Music Academy in New York.

“This experience allowed me to be immersed in a college program with people with the same mindset I have,” she said. “It was such an incredible experience for me — incredible in that it solidified my goal to pursue music as a career.” 

McCurdy will begin preparations for her career in music at Syracuse University in Syracuse, N.Y., this fall.