When I was in eighth grade at a parochial school in the Midwest, I received a scholarship to the high school as the No. 1 student. This was a school tradition. For 70 years, I have felt guilty that the No. 2 student transferred to the public high school instead of continuing his Catholic education. My family was not wealthy, but I would have gone to the Catholic high school whether it was free or not. Should we have refused the scholarship so that someone more needy could use it?A way to mitigate the guilt that has followed you for 70 years could be to pay it forward by donating a scholarship to your high school, perhaps for the #2 student from your elementary school, or for a high performing student with financial need. I'm sure the school would be happy to guide you in how to best target the scholarship.
If you can't afford to donate funds for a scholarship in perpetuity, I doubt they'd say no to a one-time scholarship to put one student through four years of high school.
If (like mine) your old high school has since closed, you could donate to another comparable school in your community of origin, or in your current community.
If there isn't a high school that's a suitable option, another possibility would be to donate the amount of a typical Catholic high school tuition towards the post-secondary education of a needy student (someone from the public high school your classmate attended?).
In any case, you'd be using the fruits of your education to make a comparable education available to someone else, thereby, at a minimum, balancing the scales.
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