Building Futures: Donna Ferracone’s Legacy of Support at RESA

Publish Date: Sept. 11, 2026

Few people have demonstrated as strong a commitment to helping students become first-responders as Donna Ferracone, who retired from Crafton Hills College in 2009 after 20 years of service as a faculty member, department chair, and dean of career and technical education. 

She developed a valuable partnership between CHC and the Regional Emergency Services Academy (RESA) to help high school seniors interested in public service careers who can go on to complete a program at CHC. RESA introduces these seniors to careers in public service through a week-long summer program run by local police and fire departments.  

For many students, the academy represents their first opportunity to see these careers as something within their reach.

Ferracone has understood how encouragement and opportunity can make a lasting difference in the life of a young person. She has stepped up to help students continue their education after RESA by establishing a scholarship specifically benefiting RESA students as they take the next step in their educational and professional journeys.

This year marked an exciting milestone as the scholarship was awarded to its first two recipients.

For these students, the scholarship represents much more than financial assistance. It is a message that someone believes in their potential, recognizes the work they have already put in, and wants to help them continue moving forward.

The inaugural awards also mark the beginning of something larger. Each future recipient will become part of a legacy that began with Ferracone's decision to invest directly in RESA students and the next generation of public safety professionals.

RESA students arrive with different backgrounds, experiences, and goals, but they share an interest in serving others. Through education, mentorship, hands-on experiences, and the support of people like Ferracone, they are given the opportunity to turn that interest into a pathway to a career.

Although the impact of a scholarship can be measured in dollars, its true value is found in the doors it opens.

For RESA's first two scholarship recipients, those doors are just beginning to open. And thanks to Donna Ferracone's generosity and commitment to students, many more will have the opportunity to follow.