You can help make the dream of college a reality for someone who otherwise couldn’t afford it. Your gift—of any size—will help fund a scholarship for first-generation college students at Georgia State University. #30for30

OUR PROJECT:

Terrance Rogers and Kyle Stapleton, Georgia State Alums, have celebrated each of their last nine birthdays by hosting fundraisers to support worthy causes. This year is a big one! They are celebrating the Big 3-0 and have decided this milestone calls for them to up their fundraising game.

Terrance and Kyle want you to join them in establishing a scholarship for first-generation students at Georgia State University. The goal is to go 30 for 30—raising $30,000 in conjunction with their 30th birthdays.

Why $30,000? Aside from it providing nice symmetry with their birthdays, $30,000 will establish a scholarship so that GSU can provide more opportunities to first-generation students.  What this means, is that your gift today won’t merely help one student, one time. By making a donation to support this project, you’ll be helping first-generation students at GSU for years to come.

THE IMPACT/WHY GIVE:

This project has two main goals:

1. Establish a scholarship to benefit First-Generation students at GSU.
2. Demonstrate the collective impact that people can have when they come together in support of a common cause.

First-generation college students—students who are the first in their families to attend college—often face additional obstacles in pursuing their education. By creating this scholarship, Terrance and Kyle hope to alleviate some of the financial burden and provide additional resources for these students. Subsequently, if the goal is reached, an endowed scholarship will be established and GSU will be able to award it to future first-generation students as well.

WHO WE ARE:

Terrance Rogers and Kyle Stapleton are both Georgia natives who come from working-class families. Over the past nine years, they have dedicated their birthdays to making a difference. In 2009, Terrance set out to get 22 people (for his 22nd birthday) to donate $10 each to Gwinnett County’s Upward Bound program. He and his friends smashed that goal and wound up raising over $1,000. As a result, the My Birthday Fundraiser initiative was started to encourage people around the world to show the same dedication.

As the first two contributors to the My Birthday Fundraiser initiative, Terrance and Kyle are celebrating their 30th birthdays in a big way. They both knew they wanted to stretch the initiative further; to do something more impactful and long-lasting. Through the initiative, Kyle and Terrance want to help more working-class students like themselves access and earn the kinds of opportunities they’ve been fortunate to have. With that came the idea to go 30 for 30 and establish a scholarship to benefit first-generation students at Georgia State.