Ruth Meese lived her life as we would want others to remember us, with care and compassion and wanting the best for everyone. She valued diversity in education and business and proved herself time and again in the working world that women were absolutely equal to men for intelligence, creativity and work ethic.

Ruth grew up in Wisconsin, where her father was the President of the Beloit Corporation, where they made machines that made paper. He had 14 patents over the course of his career. He instilled in Ruth that she could be successful in anything she attempted, and she tried many careers. When she graduated from UW-Madison, she opened her own crafts and clothes making store which she did successfully for five years. She then went on to work for General Tire, two different search firms, a school district, and a church jail ministry program, all before landing at FRCC. Her career was varied and anyone looking at her resume would say that it was a successful career. She retired in October of 2017 to go be a full-time grandmother.

She had this vibrant and diverse career, even after having a stroke in 2000. Unfortunately, that stroke was part of an underlying problem that she did not know existed, and in January of 2019, she passed away after an extremely short 19-day battle with leukemia. We are all saddened at her passing.

During her last job over her outstanding career, she was able to channel her passions into FRCC when she was asked to manage the $25M machining grant consortium as FRCC led the way to create a top notch program that our manufacturing partners have supported as their companies continue to grow. She realized quickly that her being fair and firm centered around one thing, excellent communication. Over the five years that she managed the grant for FRCC, at the end of the term, only $100 was returned to the government. That is the true sign of getting everything she could out of that grant.

She had a passion to see women get to the point of being equals in the worksite. There is no way to know where a young woman may have been discriminated against or told she can’t do something. Ruth didn’t care. She wanted to see women get the support that they need and how many may see that a woman may be getting a hand up, she saw it as creating equity at that point in time. Ruth’s thoughts and desires are the backbone for this scholarship. I hope you consider donating to keep this fund going to support the women of Front Range who have decided to make machining their passion, long into the future. Thank you for your consideration.