AMI Announces Scholarship Winners

Posted 10/3/2011

Six automotive professionals are receiving scholarships to attend either the Congress of Auto Repair and Services (CARS) or the International Autobody Congress and Exposition (NACE), both of which are part of Automotive Service and Repair Week Oct. 5-8 in Orlando, Fla.

The scholarships were jointly announced by the Automotive Management Institute (AMI) and the Automotive Service Association (ASA).

Each scholarship winner will receive $1,000 to apply toward expenses for attending the events.

NACE scholarship recipients are:

• Chris Renfro, general manager for Car-O-Van Collision Center, Orlando, Fla. He is the recipient of this year's Emil Stanley Merit Award.

The award honors Stanley, who was publisher of Automotive Body Repair News (ABRN) until his death in 1989.

• Kristine Linscombe, manager, Hernandez Collision Center, Hinesville, Ga. She is the winner of this year's BodyShop Business Magazine Scholarship.

• James Noe, manager for Nagy's Collision Specialists, Orrville, Ohio. He is being awarded the Richard Cossette/ Gale Westerlund Memorial Scholarship.

Cossette owned Lehman's Garage in Minneapolis, and was a charter founder of AMI and a $50,000 Charter Counselor contributor to AMI's resource development effort, EXCEL. He also held numerous leadership positions on the ASA board of directors and was active in several industry organizations until his death in 2002.

Westerlund owned and operated Gale's Auto Center in Blaine, Minn., and was a $25,000 Guarantor contributor to EXCEL. He served on ASA's board of directors for many years and was an active member of ASA and other collision industry organizations until his death in 2005.

CARS scholarship winners are:

• Donald Schnitzler, owner, Don's Auto Repair Inc., Cincinnati, the recipient of the Tom B. Babcox Memorial Scholarship.

Schnitzler's announcement was made in conjunction with Babcox Publications.

• John Firm, owner, Firm Automotive, Fort Worth, Texas, winner of the Zurich "High Octane" scholarship. The announcement that Firm would be the recipient of the Zurich scholarship was made by AMI in conjunction with Zurich (formerly Universal Underwriters Group).

• Tawaina Frost, office manager and service consultant, Price's Automotive Services Inc., Wrightsville, Ga., who was awarded the AVI Education Scholarship. AMI made the announcement in conjunction with Automotive Video Inc. (AVI).

The AVI Educational Scholarship was established by EXCEL (AMI's resource development program) in conjunction with AVI, a leader in automotive diagnostic and repair training programs for automotive repair professionals.

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