The Cynthia Earley Scholarship

04/29/2022

The Cynthia Earley Scholarship will not be awarded this year at The Great Chesapeake Bay Swim in lieu of the first "RJA Perseverance Award" being offered by the Robert J. Astheimer Memorial Foundation. We hope to be back at future GCBS events in celebration of the student/athlete and Cynthia Earley.

05/04/2020

Wishing a happy 87th birthday to the late Cynthia Earley who is honored each year at The Great Chesapeake Bay Swim with the scholarship that carries her name. She knew the possibilities of what education can bring to a young person's life and the benefit it passes on to our society. Since 1999 each one of The Cynthia Earley Scholarship winners carries with them the spirit of what Cynthia brought to life - love of community and the value of an active lifestyle. She was a great tennis player, swimmer, traveler, singing for years in the St. Mary's Parish & School, Annapolis choir and was always interested in continuous learning.

06/25/2019

The Cynthia Earley Scholarship, now in its 20th year is excited to announce its 2019 $1,000 award winner participating in The Great Chesapeake Bay Swim (GCBS) held on June 9th.
Ms. Madelyn “Maddie” McGreevy, 18 years old of Rehoboth Beach, DE performed as well in the community as she did in the water, obtaining $525 in sponsorships from Dewey Beach Patrol and The Starboard Restaurant for GCBS charities which included the March of Dimes Maryland-National Capital Area Chapter and Chesapeake Bay Trust.
The daughter of Michael and Sarah McGreevy, Maddie found the GCBS to be one of the hardest swims she has ever been in, even compared to ocean swims. Training this spring with the renowned Barracudas Swimming Club she finished 98th overall from 560 participating in the 2.2 mile swim. This year’s standard 4.4 mile GCBS was reduced to 2.2 mile because low visibility and winds, even with the reduction in distance she found the mighty Chesapeake “choppy and hard to see the buoys”.
Maddie is a first-time participant in the GCBS but is not the first in her family to participate, as her Uncle Mike was in the open water swim just a few years ago.
The education horizon is very promising for Maddie, a recent graduate of Cape Henlopen High School, she is headed to Loyola University Maryland to major in Finance and Accounting and be a part of the women’s swimming program Loyola Greyhounds where we believe she will have an outstanding NCAA carrer and as a student!
We are extremely proud of Maddie who said she is looking forward to another opportunity next year with the GCBS and like all of our scholarship winners, embodies selfless dedication to family, education, community and athletics.

06/25/2019

06/24/2019

Get ready for a big announcement tomorrow morning as we introduce the 2019 Cynthia Earley Scholarship Award from The Great Chesapeake Bay Swim held earlier this month. You will want to meet this outstanding young lady!

05/10/2019

One Month to go untill the The Great Chesapeake Bay Swim and another opportunity for a student 15-22 y/o to be awarded $1K check for the top fundraiser ($500 or more) for GCBS charities.

09/03/2018

As the Cynthia Earley Scholarship enters its 20th year (1999-2019) we wanted to take a look back at the academic progress of our award winners as they continue their goals of education:
Winner of four scholarship awards for the most money raised in the student category for The Great Chesapeake Bay Swim charities, Logan Smith, of Arnold, Maryland, graduated cm laude from the Case Western Reserve University School of Engineering this May with a double major Bachelor of Science degree in aerospace engineering and mechanical engineering. He also won first place in the Engineering and Computer Science Poster Competition for his project, “Structure and Stabilization of Laminar Jet Diffusion Flames.”
In addition to being a 4-year starter on the men’s varsity swim team, Smith was a captain of the team during his senior year and earned two swim team awards – the Men’s Coaches’ Award and the Ultimate Spartan Award. He competed on Case Western’s conference championship team all 4 years and earned several B qualifying times for the NCAA Division III championships. Smith is now entering his first year of graduate school working towards a Master of Science degree in aerospace engineering.
Giving himself a well-deserved break this summer, Logan visited several of America’s national parks with school mates.
We are enormously proud to have the caliber of young people like Logan representing our scholarship and believe there are many great accomplishments ahead of him.

06/29/2018

An estimated 645 swimmers from across the country attempted the 4.4 swim from Sandy Point Beach to a small beach on Kent Island, near the foot of the eastbound span of the Chesapeake Bay Bridge. To reach the beach, they swam beneath the bridge spans. The race this year started at 12:30 p.m., which w...

06/30/2017

We are proud to announce that Logan Smith was the winner at this year's Cynthia Earley Scholarship awarded at The Great Chesapeake Bay Swim. It was Logan's 4th time as our scholarship winner raising over $1000 this year for GCBS charities March of Dimes Maryland-National Capital Area Chapter and Chesapeake Bay Trust among others. Logan is entering his senior year at Case Western Reserve University studying mechanical engineering. He had another great 4.4 mile swim, finishing 62nd out of 540 who started, and 10th in the non-wetsuit division. It's harder to swim across The Chesapeake Bay without a wetsuit and Logan does it to perfection.

Tom and Esme Neely Smith have two sons (Taylor and Logan) who have been either first or second in fundraising for this scholarship since 2010, and have supported and promoted their involvement both in the water and more importantly as future college graduates. The family has contributed over $10,000 to GCBS charities during this time. It is such a pleasure to see these young men advance each year as people and future leaders in our society.

05/04/2017

Wishing a happy 84th birthday to the late Cynthia Earley. She knew the possibilities of what education can bring to a young person's life and the benefit it passes on to our society. We look forward to presenting the 19th $1,000 scholarship in her name at the The Great Chesapeake Bay Swim awards ceremony Sunday, June 11th.

07/03/2016