Rachel, Dinosaur Bones NOT Loans, Part II

Hello Rachel, the 18 year old Indiana paleontologist-to-be...here's Part II, or the Nitty Gritty, about how to chase monies to pay for your education in paleontology without going into debt - or accrue the LEAST amount of debt as possible.

Here's the document I sent to prospective engineering students for The Catholic University of America: School of Engineering last Spring, 2023.

I hope this helps you in the pursuit of your dreams - never, ever let money prevent you form chasing and obtaining a dream. God is good. Pray. Work hard. Ask smart people for help. Get investors. Get experience.

I'll pray for you!

April 24, 2023

Dear CUA School of Engineering accepted student:?

Raising money for your education, or a professional or community project requires getting down into the nitty gritty, so I’m calling this addendum:?“Nitty Gritty Fund-raising for your awesome UA School of Engineering Education.”

Nitty gritty on raising investors for your education

1.????Honor “the power of 10” To ask someone or a group for an investment in you is one of life’s greatest challenges, so let’s use math to be encouraged!?Remember “the power of 10.”?Ask 10 people to finance you??Only 1 of the 10 will respond favorably.?That means, clear away as fast as possible the 9 “No’s.” Ask 100 people for help, and 10 will say “YES!” while 90 will say: “No Way.”?Therefore, get the rejections out of the way immediately.

2.????How will you give back. Explain to your investor the fruit of their investment.?Established foundations will ask you to present or write a follow-up of the grant they bestow.?How and what will you give back to your community? A seasonal update letter/email of your engineering education? A summer engineering job or internship??Will you tutor middle/hs school students in your community? Around CUA??Assist students as they apply to college? Talk to hs/middle school students about engineering? Work with the homeless??Do engineering mission projects??Intern with Ms. Renay Serrano in the CUA EECS dept??

3.????Edit the letter. Ask a friend, a teacher, your family member, or a librarian to edit your pitch letter.?Write in a concise way about your education, work, volunteer, and community experience.?Whether it’s mowing lawns, working at the shoe place, volunteering, helping with chores, tutoring others, singing in the choir, playing football etc... Set your activities in chronological order by section: education, work experience, volunteer experience, sports et...

4.????A sure thing. Tell potential donors why you are a sound investment.?Tell your grandmother, grandfather, Colgate, the Seattle Seahawks, the Society of Black Women Engineers, Apple the who, what, where, when, why, how of why you are “a sure thing,” for an investment.

5.????Research every possible money source. Find every scholarship, grant, fund, foundation, group for which you are eligible to receive money. Research at your local or school library, or its counseling office ALL grants, scholarships, funds for which you qualify. Your school and town libraries and/or your counseling office will have a are very big book or a data base/research engine with a list of all kinds of scholarships, grants, etc... Apply to ALL these places.?Ask the librarian to help you -- and tell them you are looking for money and if they have any ideas of people to invest to pass along your name.?

6.????There’s a lid for every pot they say.?Translation: There’s a foundation for the many and varied engineering students out there: Football playing engineers, Christian Engineers, Black Engineers, Italian American engineers, first generation engineers, Society of Women Engineers, Women Engineers, etc... Also, there are many groups, non-profits, lobbying groups who may want to invest in you:?Atheists, Libertarians, Southern Baptist Conference, a local bank, National Rifle Association, Pro-life association. Apply for funds from them.

7.????Assemble a budget of what you need:?

Tuition (X dollars) + Transportation (Y dollars) + room/board (Z dollars) + Living Expenses (A dollars) + Books (C dollars) + Incidentals (D dollars) + Insurance (F dollars) = $40,000/year or ____ X dollar amount you need for the 2023/2024 school year and the 3 years to come.?

8.????Assemble a calendar and schedule for your fund-raising. Set manageable tuition fund-raising goals, so that you are not overwhelmed by CUA's tuition. Try to raise a certain amount of money each week or month with every pitch, email, phone call, card, letter, blast email, presentation, talk, church presentation. State that by the end of X month you will have raised Y dollars; by May 2023, you’ll raise Z dollars.?To raise CUA $40,000/year tuition plus incidentals you need 40 donors to give you $1,000.00/each; 80 donors to give $500.00/each; 160 donors to give $250.00/each; or 320 donors give you $125.00/each ?

9.????Email, draft a letter, call, text every single person you, your parents, your immediate and extended family know personally: churches, medical doctors, dentists, Little League team, hockey travel group, society, club, Nature Society, Bird watching group to which you, your parents, and Uncle Hank belong.?Tell each group you want to raise the $40,000 + incidentals, so you can attend CUA. *Remember you need to raise this figure for the next 4 years: Go hard to raise the money! *

10.?Make a list of ANY engineering company for which you want to work: Boeing, Tesla, SpaceX etc..., IBM, M.I.T., Research whether they have grants/scholarships/monies for up-and-coming engineers. Ask for the grant/scholarship/money. EVEN IF THEY DO NOT HAVE GRANTS, ask them to pay for your education using your pitch letter and resume.?Write a hard copy of a letter, and mail or email it. Contact them on their website, or call.?Also, contact them with a profile you make on LinkedIn.?*Remember: not asked for is not received = no asking, no receiving.

11.?Create a LinkedIn profile. Reach out to every single person at every single engineering firm for which you want to work and tell them you are interested in talking to them about: A. whether they have a scholarship/fund/grant/donated monies for up-and-coming engineering students and B. whether they have summer, winter paid/unpaid internships for 1st year, 2nd year, and 3rd year engineering students.?Tell them you'd like to apply for the internship.?

12.?Make a list of the 25 to 50 companies/products which your family uses and has used for your whole life: Colgate, Crest, Hyundai, Chrysler, Cheerios, Ivory Soap, etc.... Now go to their website and see if they have any grants, scholarships, funds, monies available for young Americans who are college-bound, school of engineering-bound.?EVEN IF THEY HAVE NOT ADVERTISED ANY such monies pitch to them anyway. Tell them you and your family are loyal customers and that you have invested in them your consumer dollars for a generation and ask if they’ll invest in you.?Promise to give them updates on your education and volunteer work at the CUA School of Engineering.?

?*Note* I reached out to NFL football teams, famous recording teams, the Texas Rangers baseball team, 7-11 (yes 7-11), Sephora makeup store, Lord & Taylor, Godiva chocolates, etc..., and they gave monies/time/talent to my students – and me – for projects. Try it. You will be happily surprised how businesses and corporations invest in their customers. ?

13.??Be sure to tell every single person: Aunts, cousins, coaches, the drycleaner lady, the gas station attendant that you are school of engineering college-bound, and you are interested in raising monies for tuition.?Every person in the Milky Way Galaxy who may know you or who may distantly know your cousin should be on alert that you are a hard-working Catholic University of America School of Engineering up and coming 2027 graduating student who very much wants to pay for her/his education....

14.?Be creative.?Do a 24-hour help-the-homeless-a-thon that’s also a fund-raiser for you. People can pledge $1.00/hour. ?With friends or family make sandwiches, soup, tea, muffins from evening to morning and spend 24 hours passing out the food, cards, and kindness to area homeless.?Do a 24-hour highway garbage pickup-a-thon. Pick up trash for 24 hours OR 2 12.5-hour days.?Ask the local hardware store to donate the bags and gloves.?Ask people to pledge $2.00/hr.?Tell the local news station that you're doing this.?If 50 people give you $50.00/each, that’s $2500! ?Or, 1/16 of your total $40,000.?Get 50 people to donate $100.00 for your 24 hour-a-thon…and that's $5,000 for a 1-day program that helps your community!?

15.?Get ANY job Whether babysitting, a mall job, slinging burgers at Burger King, working at an art store, etc... raise AS MUCH MONEY AS YOU CAN to pay for books, transportation, incidental fees etc... What's the expression??Man builds the house, and the house builds the man. Right??Work is very good for the soul.

16.?Create a blog (a website log) that’s your CUA Engineering tuition fundraising Let it describer your CUA Engineering costs: tuition, books, incidentals, travel etc.?Let them know that you must raise these monies by X month every Y year for the next 4 years. BE transparent. Do NOT be shy about how much you need to make.?Tell them you'll pay all the monies to CUA for tuition.?BE transparent.?Set up a Credit Union account and tell them the co-signor is you, your parent, or some trustworthy person. Give them the name of a CUA accounts receivable person, CUA School of Engineering Administrator, Dean, Department Chair, or professor who can vouch for you attending the school. ?Involve people in your Great Adventure:?a CUA Engineering education.?

17.?Tell donors you will send a newsletter with twice yearly updates about you. That is, set up a newsletter that you write in the Spring and Fall about how you are doing...tell people who donate to you that you'll keep them on a paper or email newsletter that tells people about your CUA School of Engineering life.... Let them be a part of the FUN of fund-raising and the fun of getting a great CUA School of Engineering education.?

18.?There are so many organizations out there on free speech, entrepreneurship, fracking, globalization, duck hunting, freedom of association, chess club/chess playing advocacy, hunting, global warming, environmentalism, gun rights, gun control, freedom of religion, immigration rights, immigration reform...and all these advocacy groups etc... have essay contests where the prize money is $1,000.00 or $500.00 or $250.00 so if you write the essay and win the contest you earn the prize money.?Look into obtaining monies from them.?

19.?Contact your senator and congressman who are always interested to know their youngest constituents’ interests, especially as it concerns technology, science, engineering, robotics, etc. Call and write to tell of your entry into the CUA School of Engineering.?Ask them to recommend to you research programs, people, groups, foundations who can help you raise money.?Ask them to put you in front of groups who may want to hear your fundraising pitch.

20.?Use social media, Facebook, Instagram, Snapchat, Twitter etc... to tell people about your Great Adventure: attending a top-notch world-class CUA School of Engineering program.... and use them to network to raise those funds!?

21.??Write thank you letters, emails, text messages to any person who helps you. Truly and truly the thank you letter and thank you note mean a lot to people.?

Finally, let me say that today many young people in America need the courage of your example.?

Either they're struggling so much financially, emotionally, spiritually because of a tough home life, and they need you to be that tutor for them, or they need to hear you talk at the local church about how you’re raising your own college tuition, or they need to hear your story of hustling to pay the bills.

Or perhaps they've always had everything paid for them and they don't know the value of a dollar, or the satisfaction of a well-earned paycheck.?You can inspire them that hard work puts spring in a woman and man's step, and that hard work makes a man and woman walk taller and straighter with chin up and shoulders back.

You can be the inspiration for yourself, for your friends and family, for your future - we hope - CUA School of Engineering colleagues, class of 2027 and beyond.

Please know I pray for you every morning and each afternoon – praying that you're making great choices for yourself, your family, your friends, and your country.

I am proud of you.?I cheer for you, and I pray for you and your families!?I wish you all the best today and in all the days to come – hoping you become a CUA Cardinal Engineer!?

Cheers and God bless,

Carol Therese Young

CUA School of Engineering recruiter

April 24, 2023

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