Miss Pearl Birmingham Scholarship Fund

About the Scholarships

T.F. Birmingham of Tulsa, Oklahoma, established the Pearl Birmingham Scholarship Fund in 1947, to comply with a request by his sister, Miss Pearl Birmingham, who died in 1946.

Miss Pearl, as her friends and students knew her, spent most of her life teaching school. She began her teaching career in Wylie where she taught first and second grades. Miss Pearl has been described as having been a "very quiet, unusually kind and pleasant person from a more than generous, happy, and religious family.

In her will, she left 1,000 shares of common stock in the Standard Oil Company of Ohio to support an annual scholarship to be given to an outstanding Wylie High School graduate.

While that first $1,000 scholarship was considered to be a most generous one, the amount of the award has increased during the years, as has the number of recipients. This has been made possible as a result of the Birmingham investment program, which school district officials have developed through the years. This year, each Wylie ISD high school will award an equal number of two-year scholarships. Annually, the scholarship awards are three $7,500 scholarships and seven $5,000 scholarships to each high school.

The first recipient of the Miss Pearl Birmingham Scholarship was the valedictorian of the Class of 1948, Harvey Moore. Moore, a successful architect, received $1,000 for four years of college study. While in college, he received payments of $25 per month.

The following guidelines are used in determining a student's eligibility to apply for the scholarship:

1. The student must be of good moral character.
2. The student must receive all of their grades from of a Wylie ISD High School.
3. The student must be in the top 10% of his/her class.
4. The student must take either the ACT or the SAT and scores must be received by March of the senior year.
5. The number of students eligible to apply for the scholarships will be limited to the top ten academically ranked students from each high school who meet the guidelines above.

Selection of the scholarship winners is based on the following:

1. The student's academic ranking.
2. The student's SAT or ACT scores.
3. Submission of an autobiography by the student.
4. A personal interview with school superintendents (or their representatives) from Collin, Dallas, and Rockwall counties.