Celebrating Our 2026 RedCloud Scholarship Recipient: Katherine Chandrabalan
Updated: Oct 14
Since 2017, RedCloud and Toys for Kids Seattle have teamed up each year to spotlight remarkable young leaders making our community kinder and brighter. Today, we are thrilled to celebrate the recipient of our 9th annual RedCloud Consulting and Toys for Kids Seattle Scholarship: Katherine Chandrabalan, an extraordinary senior at Kamiak High School!
A Calling to Care
A standout student with a 3.9 GPA, Katherine is driven by a deep passion for healthcare and is headed toward a career in nursing. During a hands-on nursing internship at Seattle Children's Hospital, she stood beside a five-year-old girl on life support and watched a nurse gently hold the child's hand. That quiet moment of compassionate care inspired her vision for the future—and ignited her dream of transforming pediatric medicine.
Leading with Heart
Katherine isn't waiting for tomorrow to make an impact—she is already actively building a more caring world across several impressive initiatives:
Children's Ministry: As Head of Children's Ministry at her church, she has built deep trust with young kids who line up for hugs and leave sweet notes sharing their love.
STEM For Kids: What started as a late-night idea became a sold-out, low-cost five-day camp for 25 elementary students! Katherine wrote the curriculum, recruited medical-assisting classmates and healthcare guest speakers, and partnered with the city to create a hands-on learning experience where six-year-olds learned to take pulses and memorize anatomical terms.
Care Crafts: She founded the first Washington chapter of this vibrant nonprofit, mobilizing students to craft personalized gifts for local healthcare facilities—donating over 1,000 handmade items!
Having experienced the loss of her father at age 10, Katherine's personal journey deeply fuels her empathy. Her ultimate goal as a healthcare provider is to create "a place where a child feels safe, wanted, and loved."
What Comes Next
Next up, Katherine is pursuing her nursing degree to become a pediatric family nurse practitioner. She looks forward to bringing together the technical skill required for complex medical systems with "the compassion required to hold the hand beside it."
"Katherine embodies everything our scholarship program stands for—leading with heart, serving her community, and striving for excellence. Her vision of pairing rigorous clinical science with profound personal compassion as a pediatric nurse practitioner is truly inspiring. We couldn't be prouder to support her path forward." — Brett Alston, RedCloud Managing Partner
Join us in congratulating Katherine! We can't wait to cheer her on as she touches countless more lives and builds a brighter future for youth across our region.
Get inspired by our past scholarship recipients: Lucy Naiman (2025) | Le'Asia Lane (2024) | Alan (2023) | Desmond (2022)
