After graduating from Highland High School in 2009, I received free tuition to Indiana University Bloomington because I was a 21st Century Scholar. My father always told me to work with my brain and not my body, and I wanted to do that by being an elementary school teacher. I needed to go to college to become a teacher, but I didn’t know how to pay for college. I was a bus boy at a local restaurant, but I needed a lot more money than I could earn while also participating in sports where I gained personal skills and dedication through teamwork.

But my mother had signed me up for 21st Century Scholars, and it helped me pay for college so that I didn’t have to worry about how I was going to make ends meet. I lived my dream of going away to school because of this scholarship. If I could go back to talk to myself, I would say “Don’t worry, everything will work out. This scholarship is going to give you opportunities that you would never think of.”

Because of this scholarship, I graduated with my Bachelor’s in Elementary Education in 2013 and am now the Assistant Principal at an elementary school within School City of Hammond. Talk to your guidance counselor today to follow through with activities to keep this scholarship!