Pedro Zamora Young Leaders Scholarship 2025

Dedicated to continuing the legacy of the late AIDS educator and health and social justice activist, Pedro Zamora, these $5,000 scholarship awards support those who are working toward and committed to making a difference in the fight against HIV/AIDS and/or advancing health equity and social justice.

HIV/AIDS is a disease that intersects with social justice issues, such as discrimination, economic inequality, and human rights. Social justice initiatives can help fight HIV/AIDS by addressing these issues and improving access to healthcare. Therefore, this Scholarship is not exclusive to HIV/AIDS work and activism. If your work is change making in other areas of health, racial, or social justice, please consider applying!

Click here to meet our twenty-five 2024 Pedro Zamora Young Leaders Scholarship Awardees.

Each of these twenty-five awardees received a $5,000 scholarship.

We will award another twenty-five (25) $5,000 scholarships this year.

This award program is open to applicants who study or reside in the U.S.

Although ChatGPT and similar AI programs are valuable tools, they cannot replace a human voice - they cannot tell your story like you can! Your unique talents, goals, values, and personality are what we are most interested in. Our application platform uses an AI & tool designed to identify plagiarism and AI use in application essay responses. Provide as much of your own voice as possible, and while we won’t remove applications for AI usage, we will note the percentages in our final decisions for awards.

This scholarship supports young leaders who carry the torch of activists, like Pedro, in pursuit of a bold vision that never again will a community be harmed because of fear, silence, discrimination, or stigma. Much like Pedro himself, this Scholarship seeks to support young scholars who embody their activism work in ways inspired by their own passions, insights, originality, and conviction.

When the National AIDS Memorial launched the Scholarship in 2009, we looked to young activists to tell us how their career choice would impact the trajectory of the AIDS epidemic. As the program grew, we saw how more and more of our scholars worked at the intersection of health and social justice in a variety of ways.

Today, this scholarship embraces a broader interpretation of 21st century public health and health justice issues.  Examples of a scholarship recipient’s work may include, but are not limited to:

●  HIV/AIDS research, prevention, treatment, access and activism

●  Public health and health justice

●  Reproductive health

●  Serving in peer education, prevention, and community resource programs

●  Racial justice

●  Immigrant rights

●  LGBTQ+ equality and rights

●  Environmental justice

●  Drug policy and drug sentencing reform

●  Employment and economic justice issues

●  Housing and homelessness

●  Technology innovation that supports justice work
For more information about the Pedro Zamora Young Leaders Scholarship, click here.

The Pedro Zamora Young Leaders Scholarship is open to all current high school seniors and first-year college students, sophomores and juniors (ages 27 and younger), including those who are finishing their Bachelor’s degree. Our scholars' academic, extracurricular, or career pursuits are consistent with the goals of the Scholarship, demonstrate an active commitment to the fight against HIV/AIDS and/or community justice work, and take on public service and leadership roles.

This scholarship celebrates and supports young people who are doing work inspired by (or similar to) the late HIV/AIDS, health, racial, and social justice activist, Pedro Zamora, but, again - it is not necessarily just about HIV/AIDS.  If your work is change-making in other areas of social justice and health justice, this scholarship is probably for you!

A panel of esteemed judges will be reviewing each application to confirm that the applicant has thoroughly addressed the questions and prompts, uploaded all required documents, and meets the eligibility requirements detailed in our Application Requirements. For the Pedro Zamora Young Leaders Scholarship Application Requirements, Click Here.