It does not take much to imagine what it is like to try to study or sit in class if you are chronically hungry or malnourished. While some of us may joke...

Sometimes, it’s the small stuff. When Paul Arenberg first approached me in 2010 about an Executive Director’s discretionary fund, I said a hasty “no thank you.” My public policy and nonprofit upbringing...

I read a letter aloud to several staff members last week. After I finished, Program Director Thurman Young summed up the story as one of redemption, practically writing the blogpost for me....

I have a story for you. We’ve received word of a gift totaling $17,000 we will receive in the coming month or two. But that’s the middle of the story. In 2003,...

Shame on me. Today I remembered two important things: family values and matzo ball soup. In 28 years, you would think I’d have learned the magic of The Scholarship Foundation of St....

In 1926, six years after the first interest-free loan was made, Scholarship Foundation founder Meta Bettman typed out a five-page essay, explaining the connection between this seemingly individual act (a scholarship to...

In a staff of 13, it seems odd to refer to three people as a “department.” So, for purposes of this blog post, I’ll just tag them Superheroes of The Scholarship Foundation....

At 3, my daughter somehow knew to raise her right fist, close her eyes, and declare herself. Doing so did not diminish her love for her baby brother or her desire to...

It is the season in which we see monarch butterflies migrating south. The monarch is considered a symbol of hope, of persistence, of transcendence, of the beauty and utterly natural phenomenon of...

“Can you tell I’m anxious? new art coming.  I’m excited.  It’s dark, scary…like the way the future seems sometimes.” Vivian, a first-year college student, typed these words into her Instagram post with...

This is the fourth draft I have written in four days.  Each day, more public pronouncements on race and hate and history find their place in mainstream and social media. Several of...

The image on the left is me, the last time I earned minimum wage. During my college summers I worked two jobs to save for the school year. Minimum wage was $3.35...