The Impact of the City of Berlin Scholarship

The City of Berlin scholarship has lasting impacts on the recipients. With their permission, we are sharing the stories of scholarship recipients to showcase the influence the scholarship has had on not only their academic journeys, but their lives.

Juliane Leigh Forsyth

Juliane Leigh Forsyth was seven years old on 9/11 when her father Warren – as well as her two uncles — were called into duty as New York City Fire Department (FDNY) firefighters at the World Trade Center after two jets piloted by terrorists deliberately crashed into the buildings. They arrived as the towers collapsed, working endlessly to help their coworkers and civilians. Their rescue and recovery efforts lasted months at the World Trade Center. FDNY members worked relentlessly to extinguish the fires and continue their rescue and recovery efforts — dangerous and lethal undertakings that greatly affected the health of the first responders. To this day, over 350 FDNY firefighters have lost their lives to 9/11 related illnesses, including her uncle, Gregory Forsyth.

As a native New Yorker and current New York resident, Juliane Forsyth has long since dedicated her life to public service and has worked in the FDNY since 2019, at the age of 25 — joining her family as a fourth generation firefighter along with her brother, sister, and cousin. But Forsyth has taken her dedication to even higher levels and recently completed her Masters degree in Emergency Management from John Jay College College The City University of New York (CUNY)— thanks in part to funding from the City of Berlin Scholarship administered by the Checkpoint Charlie Foundation.

“The generosity of the people of Berlin have helped support not only my academia but have supported a promise to help make a difference in the lives of others for the greater good,” Forsyth said. “The gift of scholarship…has heavily influenced my life.”

The City of Berlin Scholarship was funded by Berlin residents who spontaneously donated $1 million out of solidarity for New York firefighters in the immediate aftermath of 9/11. There is about $400,000 still in the fund that is parceled out in $5,000-per-year scholarships to partially help cover some of the secondary education costs for more than 130 children of firefighters who were killed or injured in the terror attack.

The Checkpoint Charlie Foundation just recently awarded another 22 scholarships of $5,000 each to children of FDNY firefighters for the 2025/26 academic year.

“As a child of a FDNY firefighter who was severely injured in the attacks, I was informed by acquaintances that funds were collected to help support the children of heroes who were severely injured or killed in the line of duty,” Forsyth said when asked how she learned about the COB scholarships back in 2011 when she was first applying to colleges. “Like most large American families, we did not have the financial means to fully support my academic goals.”

So she started scouring scholarship opportunities and with the help of the Friends of Firefighters, Inc. association in Brooklyn, New York discovered the Checkpoint Charlie and the COB.

“The City of Berlin Scholarship is much more than a generous award,” said Forsyth, who took the German-American friendship to an even higher level later on by doing an eight-week internship in Berlin with the Berlin Feuerwehr (fire department) in 2017 during her undergraduate career at Hunter College. “It is a sign of compassion, friendship and support through hardships many of our families encountered from 9/11. It is comforting to know there are foreign cities who want to help the future of children who experienced tragedy so early in their lives. The generosity from the people of Berlin has shown that even after all these years, the heroes of 9/11 will be honored. Most importantly, the scholarship is a warm-hearted gesture that no one has to go through hardships alone.”

The spirit of support from Berlin residents reflects their undying gratitude towards the United States for its leadership with the 1948/49 Berlin Airlift that kept West Berlin free during the Cold War as well as the U.S. support for West Berlin after the Berlin Wall was built in 1961 and divided the city in half.

“I truly understand why the people of Berlin feel so connected to helping those who were affected by 9/11” said Forsyth. She spent eight weeks living in Berlin and working with the Berlin Fire Department and had the chance to visit museums, Checkpoint Charlie, remnants of the Berlin Wall and the Checkpoint Charlie Foundation to learn more about the Cold War history of the formerly divided city. “It was eye-opening to visit such historic sites and learn about the troubling times the people of Berlin had lived under.”

Forsyth was studying Fine Arts with a concentration in Photography and a double minor in Art History and German in 2017 while working at a local newspaper in New York as a photojournalist. So as an intern in Berlin, she worked for the press office of the Berlin Feuerwehr. She visited firehouses all across Berlin, visited the fire academy, fire museum and learned about the culture and traditions of the Feuerwehr in Berlin.

“Needless to say, even from thousands of miles away, I learned that brotherhood is a universal language,” she said. “The members of the BFW loved their jobs deeply and had the same kindred spirit as my loved ones in the FDNY. Every day at the internship felt like I was visiting family. It was an incredible experience that I will never forget. The amount of pride, strength, compassion, and bravery that all the men and women I met at the BFW has shown how small this world really is and how deeply connected we are.”

Forsyth said she became friends with many members of the BFW and visited their families for dinners. “I never felt for once that I was living in a foreign country that summer,” she said. “Everywhere I went, I was welcomed with open arms. The generosity and hospitality of the members of the BFW made me believe there is a special bond there.”

Forsyth was first awarded a COB scholarship for her undergraduate degree at Hunter College but was able to complete that degree in 2018 with the help of another scholarship. She postponed the COB Scholarship for a graduate degree, which she completed in 2025 while working full time for the FDNY.

She currently is using her Masters Degree in Emergency Management to advocate for firefighter safety to New York City Council members. She hopes to continue to use her degree to work in urban search and rescue partnerships with federal task forces. This involves deploying with a highly trained unit to areas that are severely affected by disasters.

“It’s hard to say what I hope to accomplish in my career as things evolve and change so rapidly,” said Forsyth, who is currently working as a firefighter at FDNY Ladder 136 in Queens, NY. “I hope, though, that I can make a difference in the lives of as many as I can.”

She said she deeply appreciates the value of exchange programs and also plans to stay connected to the Checkpoint Charlie Foundation and the COB Scholarship.

“I’m looking forward to the future of this scholarship program and hope that it can help inspire an entire generation to pay it forward as the United States and Berlin have historically done for each other for generations.”

Christopher Buss

Christopher Buss is a paraprofessional, educating students with significant developmental delays and autism. For the past three and a half years, he pursued his master’s degree part time and this summer and fall will be sitting the examination exams to become a licensed NYC special education teacher. The City of Berlin Scholarship has enabled him to excel in his program without becoming overburdened with loans. Further, it allowed him to pursue his degree while supporting himself with a low paying job offering a high level of experience in his future field.

The City of Berlin Scholarship “has given a chance for individuals like myself to excel and achieve careers without swimming in overwhelming debt due to the limited resources from our families because of death or disability of our parental unit from the devastating 9/11 tragedy that has weighed on our country, particularly NYC and our families. My parents’ eyes swell with tears of gratitude and amazement that the City of Berlin Scholarship Fund in another amazing country has the focus and generosity to care and support families in the US. It amazes us all that the German people would extend their charitable spirit overseas to help people outside of their country so far away. Coincidentally, my family is of German descent, surname BUSS. My dad’s dad is fully German tracing our ancestry back to Germany, which touched us deeply.