SOUTH PORTLAND, Maine—One of the things that we here at Norris really love doing is contributing to and enriching our communities, helping out and giving back to our customers.

As academic year 2017-2018 approaches a close, Norris prepares to award its inaugural Norris Scholarships to two of its awesome school system clients, helping two students with higher education costs.

Norris will give a $1,000 scholarship to one student at RSU 14: Windham/Raymond Schools and one student RSU 54: Skowhegan Area Schools.

Recipients will receive certificates of their awards at an achievement night each school will hold on June 7th, 2018. Norris personnel will be onsite at each event, helping to toast the students and deliver the certificates.

Area schools benefit from Norris drive to give back

Asked to speak about the achievement night, Windham High School Principal Chris Howell said the evening is a way to honor the hard work of those in the community growing into adulthood.

“The purpose of awards night is to celebrate the achievements of students within the class of 2018. It is a time to reflect back on all that they have accomplished during their time in high school,” he said. “Seniors Awards Night has been a long-standing tradition at Windham High School.”

Students interested in the inaugural scholarship need to have good grades and be interested in pursuing one or more areas of study that are of import to the security industry—electrical sciences, fire sciences, software development, or networking and network security.

Students also will have to write an essay describing their interests and future plans to qualify.

School officials happy for the give-back

Officials at the schools were happy to be the beneficiaries of the inaugural Norris Scholarship.

“Most of the scholarships that we give are memorial scholarships or scholarships that are funded by non-profits in the community,” Howell said. “It is exciting to be able to add a corporate award to our scholarship night. The presentation of this award may open the doors for other organizations to think about giving to our students.”

Skowhegan Area High School Guidance Administrator and Scholarship Committee Chair Jane Bigelow agreed. “An investment in a student’s education is an investment in the future. The collaboration between school and community fosters positive relationships and future growth,” Bigelow said. “We are very fortunate to have the support of our local community and service organizations.”

Giving back is what it’s all about

Norris CEO Jason Roberts said this kind of outreach and giving back is extremely important.

“Investing in our youth is a great way to give back to our community that has done so much to support our business. We are passionate about what we do and get excited when we see others wanting to pursue studies in relevant fields,” Roberts said. “Beyond offering scholarships, we are assisting Technical Schools by way of equipment donation, and/or time teaching our youth, also. It’s an important component of being a responsible community member.”

Norris Bangor Operations Manager and Skowhegan High School Alum Brooks Thompson advocated for his alma matter to be an inaugural recipient. Thompson will be personally on hand at Skowhegan’s award ceremony to deliver the certificate to the winning student. Thompson will be accompanied by Norris Chief Technology Officer, Josh Delano.

“At Norris, we value education and want to foster growth in the science and technology fields for tomorrow’s professionals. Norris Incorporated encourages it’s employees to be valued and involved members of their communities,” Thompson said. “Helping today’s youth to advance their educations is just one way Norris Incorporated can give back to small communities like Skowhegan.”

Norris CEO Roberts will attend the Windham awards ceremony to hand an award certificate to that school’s winning student. Roberts will be accompanied by yours truly, Norris Marketing & Business Development Rep, Dan Gelinas.

Helping our customers out

Both RSU 14 and RSU 54 are valued customers of Norris Inc. We help them keep their kids safe by providing them the absolute best and technologically advanced intrusion detection, access control, surveillance, emergency communications and fire alarm systems.

Norris, Inc.—a South Portland, Maine, based life-safety and security systems integrator with satellite offices in Bangor, Maine; Lee, New Hampshire; and Burlington, Vermont—was founded nearly 40 years ago by two brothers, Brad and Harty Norris. The brothers remain on the board of directors today and continue to help steer the enterprise toward its goal of advancing security, life safety and communications while striving to grow in its status as Northern New England’s leading systems integrator. Norris provides fully integrated life-safety and security solutions, including fire alarm systems, intrusion detection systems, access control systems, video surveillance systems, emergency notification systems and communications systems.