Scholarships
As part of our mission to ensure access to the arts for all, we are excited to be able to offer two scholarships to retreat participants. We are deeply honored to be able to spread arts, poetry and healing in honor of these two individuals and the magic they both lived by.
Mary Fulton Scholarship
Born in Denver on January 10, 1965, Mary was the second offive children to Kerwin and Betty Fulton. From a young age, she radiated kindness and steadiness—always quick with a smile, dedicated to her responsibilities, and ready to lend a hand wherever it was needed. Her gentle spirit and warm presence touched everyone who knew her.
Mary dedicated her entire professional life to advancing education through her work at the Education Commission of the States (ECS), where she served as a respected education policy analyst. Over the years, she became known nationwide for her depth of knowledge, thoughtful analysis, and unwavering commitment to improving education systems for all.
A lifelong person of faith, Mary got her undergraduate degree from Benedictine College and was deeply rooted in Denver’s Lutheran community. She was a devoted member of both St. Paul Lutheran Community of Faith and, more recently, Our Savior’s Lutheran Church, where she was known for her radiant smile, generous heart, and loving hugs during the passing of the peace.
As one fellow church member shared, “She always had a spirit-lifting smile and a kind word.”
In addition to her deep commitment to her work and church, Mary cherished her life in Denver’s Capitol Hill neighborhood. She found joy in every corner—from her longtime neighbors in the apartment building to friends at the community garden, and the local shops and art galleries she loved to frequent. Her genuine enthusiasm for the small, everyday wonders of neighborhood life was contagious, making her a natural connector and a vital part of many community circles.
Mary’s quiet strength, grace, and compassion were all the more remarkable given that she lived with chronic nerve pain for the last twenty years of her life. Though shifts in the weather could bring debilitating discomfort, she met each day with a calm presence and steady warmth that belied the private storms she so often endured.
Caz Liske Scholarship
Cazimir Liske, 35, an East High School graduate, died April 24, 2017 in Moscow, Russia where he was an actor, director, musician and composer. As an undergraduate at Dartmouth College, he directed the college’s oldest a cappella group, the Dartmouth Aires. He was one of the first Americans to graduate from the Moscow Art Theatre School in 2009, and the first American invited to teach at the school. In addition to English, he was fluent in Russian and Italian. He frequently taught at the National Theater Institute at the Eugene O’Neill Theatre Center in Connecticut. In 2014, he developed and directed a new production of Illusions, by Ivan Viripaev, a leading contemporary Russian playwright, at the Baryshnikov Arts Center in New York. His numerous stage credits include plays in London and Moscow. He co-directed Romeo and Juliet in Mostar, Bosnia-and-Herzegovina.
“Everyone that knew or met Caz even briefly was filled with his indomitable, optimistic spirit and enthusiasm for life and community,” his cousin Andrew Carothers-Liske observed.