SPUT Awards
Alison McKee Memorial Award
The prestigious Alison McKee Award was established in 2000 by Marilyn and Scott McKee as a memorial to their beautiful and accomplished daughter, Alison, who died tragically in an automobile accident at the age of 17. Alison was an outstanding tennis player at Mounds View High School, but even more than that, Alison was a National Merit Scholar who demonstrated great values in all aspects of her life.
Alison is remembered for her sense of teamwork, loyalty to her friends, her spirited and determined attitude and her sense of honesty and fairness in all that she did.
The recipient of this award is a young man or woman who demonstrates many of the outstanding characteristics that Alison possessed:
- An outstanding academic record (she was a Commended National Merit Scholar).
- An excellent tennis player who also loved snowboarding, music and dancing.
- A deep concern for others and loyalty to her friends and family.
- An incredible enthusiasm for life, which she encouraged others to share.
- A natural inquisitiveness for learning, especially about life and science.
- A contagious smile that brought joy to those fortunate to know her.
Alison McKee Award winners
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2000, Sheila Crabbe
- 2001, Dan Flaherty
- 2002, Jamie Olson
- 2003, Dave Johnson
- 2004, Dee Xiong
- 2005, Jeremiah Land
- 2006, Jennifer Kling
- 2007, Will Bryan
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2008, Benjamin Colwell
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2009, Taylor Heltne
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2010, Joe Hamel
Ernie Greene Scholarship Award
Ernie Greene always will be remembered. His spirit serves as the guiding light for the St. Paul Urban Tennis program, in which he was a long-time key instructor.
This scholarship is given in his honor and was initiated because of a large donation made to SPUT in Ernie’s name, which was further supplemented by donations and fund-raising events. The fund is in a fully secure and invested endowment at the Minneapolis Foundation.
In 2003, the City of Saint Paul constructed two new tennis courts at the Martin Luther King Center and named them in honor of Ernie. The plaque listing the names of all recipients of the Ernie Greene Scholarship is in the nearby MLK center.
The scholarship rewards a player or instructor from the program with a $500 award for secondary education; the award is renewable for four years.
Previous winners were:
SPORTSMANSHIP 2009 AWARD WINNERS
Boys 09 - 10 Tim Reidell, College Park & Jamie Steinmann, Macalester
Girls 09 - 10 Anne Thornton, North Dale & Emma Piorier, Carty
Boys 11 - 12 Elias Hofrenning, Macalester & Nathan Thao, Harding
Girls 11 - 12 Jane Thornton, North Dale & Emma O'Brien, St. Clair
