Published Spring 2010 At the Columbia Basin College Foundation, the first order of business is to raise money for scholarships. \u0093Last year, we provided approximately $250,000 in scholarships to 263 students,\u0094 says CBC Foundation director of philanthropy Nancy Adams. Occasionally, though, the foundation and its charitable partners find a way to combine fundraising with meaningful educational opportunities. When this happens, everybody wins.<\/P> One such opportunity came about last fall, when the CBC Foundation hosted its first \u0093Brown Bag Series\u0094 on financial literacy, called \u0093Life Happens.\u0094 Among the presenters: Shawn Flinders, Tri-Cities sales manager\/RE loan officer at Global Credit Union. Published Spring 2010Global AdvantageAt the Columbia Basin College Foundation, the first order of business is to raise money for scholarships. \u0093Last year, we provided approximately $250,000 in scholarships to 263 students,\u0094 says CBC Foundation director of philanthropy Nancy Adams. Occasionally, though, the foundation and its charitable partners find a way to combine fundraising with meaningful […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-546603","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/546603","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=546603"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/546603\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=546603"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=546603"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=546603"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
<\/SPAN>Global Advantage<\/P>
\u0093We had the strong feeling that providing students and the community with a chance to learn practical information about all aspects of personal finance would be of value,\u0094 says Adams. \u0093Several weeks into our planning, Sen. Patty Murray came to our campus and did a presentation on, believe it or not, financial literacy. When we saw what she was discussing, we knew we were on the right track.\u0094
The six-week series covered everything from insurance to wills and trusts, tenant law, credit cards and home ownership. Approximately 400 participants attended over the six weeks.
Finding the right presenters was key to the series\u0092 success. The foundation needed speakers who could provide accurate, real-world information and engage a diverse audience. \u0093Because we\u0092re a community college, we serve students ranging from ages 16 to 90 \u0096\u0096 at all stages of life,\u0094 Adams explains. With such a range of backgrounds, participants ran the gamut from young people who had little to no experience with budgeting or credit to full-fledged adults who were well established or recovering from past mistakes.
Adams and her team began the way many great collaborations do. \u0093We called our friends,\u0094 she says. Starting with financial institutions the team knew \u0096 and those it hoped to partner with in the future \u0096 made the selection process easier. \u0093Fortunately for us, we knew organizations in the financial community like Global. We were asking for a donation to our scholarship fund in addition to finding workshop leaders. (Global is) so profoundly dedicated to educating people that this was a natural priority for them.\u0094
In his workshop, Flinders covered the nuts and bolts of buying a home. \u0093To be honest,\u0094 says Adams, \u0093I wasn\u0092t sure that a lot of our students were ready to learn about home buying, but Shawn\u0092s workshop was well-attended, and the students were very attentive. Clearly, this is still the dream of Americans, to own their own homes. Shawn did a great job of explaining to the students that the process of home buying starts right now; and that all the steps that lead up to talking to a Realtor\u00ae begin when you get your first checking account and use credit cards. Your financial history is important.\u0094
As a full-time fundraiser, Adams works hard developing partnerships that enable the college to serve its community on many levels. In return, she\u0092s grateful for her own success. \u0093Kudos to a community that\u0092s always so supportive of education,\u0094 she says.<\/P><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"