Jessica Cheseboro ’06 and Jack James ’62 met in Penfield Library’s Lake Effect Café.

When Jessica Cheseboro ’06 walked across the stage at Laker Hall Dec. 16 to get her diploma, she had a lot of company, figuratively speaking.

She received help and support from her family, especially her husband; her employer and Jack James ’62, who funded a scholarship that helped Cheseboro complete her degree.

“I had a lot of help along the way, but it was a tough path,” said the business administration major from Oswego.

Cheseboro first entered college in Florida in 1992, but had to cut short her college career because of a divorce. She devoted her time to raising her children and put her college education on hold.

She was working at Walt Disney World in Florida when she met and married Ed Cheseboro, an Oswego native, and moved to Oswego.

“In 1999, we moved up here and I saw I had a university practically in my back yard,” said Cheseboro. “It was a sign to me to go back and finish what I’d begun.”

With her husband’s support, she started back part-time and went full-time in 2004. But when her husband was injured and she needed to return to work full-time to support the family, she had a choice to make.

She didn’t want to return to part-time student status, so she chose to work full-time, while holding down a full-time college course load.

Her husband helped, driving the three children — Hector, 16; Dan, 14; and Veronica, 12 — to football and basketball practices, doctors’ and dentist’s appointments and having supper prepared when she returned from work.

“It’s nice to come home to a home-cooked meal when you’re exhausted, even when you know you’re going to have to rush right out the door to the library or something,” she said with a laugh.

Her employer, Randy Ziegler ’82 of Ameriprise Financial, where Cheseboro works as office manager/financial planning assistant, has been equally generous, giving her the opportunity to take classes and make up her work hours later. He is supporting her in opportunities to advance in the company. “[My degree can mean] more responsibility, more work and more opportunities to shoot for the stars,” Cheseboro said.

And then there came the award from Jack James ’62, just when she needed it. It came late in her last semester, when she had bills to pay and the crunch of schoolwork and life collided. “It came at a time when I thought, ‘I can’t do this for another six weeks,’” she said. “The gift that he gave me, I said, ‘I can do this now.’ It put things into perspective for me.”

James, retired after 29 years with the Marine Corps and now teaching adult education at National Louis University, donated $25,000 to establish a scholarship for non-traditional students at Oswego. James envisioned his scholarship to help someone just like Cheseboro: a working mother coming back to school, a person whose career was interrupted or a veteran returning to civilian life.

Cheseboro appreciated the gift on several levels. “Not only did it help financially, but it helped me see that the light was getting bigger and bigger at the end of the tunnel and it didn’t look like a train anymore,” she said.

The scholarship award was a surprise, but an even bigger surprise came in November, when James, on campus for a meeting, sought out Cheseboro with a special gift: a diploma frame for her December graduation.

“I have felt very blessed with the opportunity to meet him,” she said of her benefactor. “Usually these scholarship funds are in memory of someone. I felt very grateful and appreciative of the fact that he set something up like this.”

James’ inspiration extended to more than encouragement to finish her degree, Cheseboro said. It has inspired her to someday give back in the same way James did.

“This act of kindness that Jack James has shown to me, has made me think hard about doing something like this,” she said. “In the conversation we had when we met, he said he worried and wondered if Oswego State would find someone for his scholarship. I know I’m not the only one out there that has had the kind of life I had.

“Everybody needs some kind of encouragement at one point or another.”

— Michele Reed