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The first Professor Chester Davis Scholarship was awarded this fall to Ariana Vazquez '21, a double major in Afro-American studies and sociology. The Professor Chester Davis Scholarship Fund was established in memory of Chester Davis by his wife Penny Ralston. Davis was one of the first Afro-American studies professors at UMass Amherst and served on the faculty from 1971 until his retirement in 1992.

Awarded annually, this fund provides financial support to undergraduate students with majors in the W.E.B. Du Bois Department of Afro-American Studies. Preference will be given to first-generation students with financial need, as determined by the financial aid office.

Vazquez is the first student to receive this award. She is a first-generation student, born and raised in Boston to Puerto Rican and Panamanian parents, who says, "I have always dreamed of graduating from a highly-regarded institution." She transferred to UMass Amherst after withdrawing from another institution and continuing her education at a community college until the death of her mother in 2017 put her studies on hold. In 2018 she was accepted to UMass Amherst and "could not have been any happier!"

"As a low-income student this scholarship will ensure that I have no worries in completing my studies at UMass Amherst and I can continue to work and research topics I am so very passionate about," says Vazquez, who chose to double major in sociology and Afro-American studies "to examine economics effects on the disadvantaged and the historical and sociological timeline of how people of color, specifically Black Americans, came to occupy the lower class."

For her senior Capstone project, Vazquez is researching "how modern day policing has drawn influence from slave patrols of the past." Vazquez plans to "pursue a career in civil rights investigation," and credits her UMass Amherst education as well as the support she received through scholarships like this one for making these aspirations possible.