Last weekend, the Scholarship Junkies team left Spokane and drove a few hours over to Omak, Washington—the largest city in Okanogan County with a population of just under 5,000. I’d been there back in 2009 for Scholarship Junkies’ presentations at nearby Tonasket High School and Okanogan High School (on my 22nd birthday, no less). In any case, it was great to be back.

We spent a few hours sharing about scholarship opportunities, both in general and specifically through theWashBoard.org. One of the themes that became even more clear to us through our time in Spokane and Omak is the need to connect students better to the plethora of scholarship resources out there, particularly those in our own state.

Even more important, though, is the need to ensure that students, parents, and educators alike understand how the process of private scholarships even work. Frankly, the conversations we had with students and parents where we shared with them about how scholarships work were equally as educational for us. We plan to roll out some new features on ScholarshipJunkies.com that will help address this need.

We are so grateful to all the staff, volunteers, students, and parents who showed up and made the events such a success. A special shout out to Becky in Omak and Jessica in Spokane for helping to organize such wonderful College Goal Sunday events. Our team felt very lucky to join you all—and hopefully make all our interviewees into movie stars as we sift through the great video footage we captured throughout the trip.

Then, of course, there are the pictures. Here are some of the highlights both from College Goal Sunday at Wenatchee Valley College in Omak and from our visit to the College Goal Sunday at the downtown central branch of the Seattle Public Library. Thanks, Amy, for letting us stop by to work alongside Mary Beth!

The beauty of Eastern Washington

Capturing the beauty of Eastern Washington

Approaching Grand Coulee Dam

Arriving in Omak

Thanks for hosting such a great event, WVCO!

Sharing about scholarships

Talking about scholarships and paying for college on camera

Trying out new technology for sharing scholarship ideas

Got your scholarship info?

"Don't delay, apply today!"

Inside the beautiful Seattle Public Library central branch

Teen service librarians have lots of scholarship resources

If you're a student in WA looking for college funding, you must check out www.theWashBoard.org

Did we mention the scholarship video contest?

Let's figure out a plan for paying for college

Always great to see the UW Dream Project!

Thanks for hosting another successful College Goal Sunday event, SPL!

If you want to see more pictures from our trip, check out our Facebook page!

We’re also thrilled that we have a few more weekly photo contest candidates this week, and as it has been during the whole scholarship video contest period, we expect that the decision will be tough. Nevertheless, we will choose a winner by tomorrow. Don’t forget though! If you are not chosen a winner, it does not mean your photo is not a good one. In fact, enter it again ’cause, who knows, you might win next week’s contest!

Our team will be visiting a few more schools next weekend, including Everett Community College (in Everett, of course) and Olympic College in Bremerton. So, if you’re in the area, stop by and say hi! Who knows, maybe we’ll make you a movie star too.

– Sam and the Scholarship Junkies team

Good morning, world!

• Make it out to Spokane in one piece and survive the frigid weather (so far): check

• Stay at a 5-star home, with 5-star food, and 5-star parents (compliments of Mr. Sam Lim and his wonderful family): check

• Spread our scholarship knowledge on to other students and parents: check

• Listen to incredible stories, from incredible students and parents, in the most eastern part of Washington that I’ve had the privilege to set foot on: check
  
• Rode a magical gondola that showed us some of the most spectacular views of the 2nd largest city in Washington: fail

I can go on and on with this list, but instead I’d rather share visually with you a quote that I saw at North Central High School, that essentially sets the stage for the “moments” that follow.

Welcome to some of our Spokane moments...

The Teaching Moments

The One on One Moments

The Planting The Seeds Early Moments

The Nikon Moments

The College Moments

The Throwback Moments

The Childhood Moments

The Spokane Moments

The Reflective Moments

The Man-Behind-The-Camera Moments

The Teamwork Moments

The Majestic Moments

The Sunset Moments

The Musical Moments

This is just some of the many spectastic moments that we’ve been experiencing so far on our 3-day weekend out in eastern Washington. This trip’s been a great reminder to pay attention to the things that are happening all around us each day. We challenge you to share some of your moments by participating in theWashBoard.org’s photo contest.

We’re gettin’ ready to hit the road to head towards our last leg of the trip — Omak, WA! Stay tuned for more updates.

Mike and the team

This morning, our team left Seattle to drive across the state to Spokane for a weekend of College Goal Sunday events in Spokane and Omak. As part of our work with theWashBoard.org, we also set out with lots of camera gear in tow, so we could gather footage for several potential videos.

Tomorrow, we’ll post a blog post with a few reflections on our first CGS event at North Central High School in Spokane, but today (since it was a travel day), we’ll just post a few highlights from traveling to Spokane. Side note: this trip also gave me (Sam) a chance to visit my family in Spokane and show our Scholarship Junkies team (Mike and Luke) around the city in which I graduated from high school. Hence, a few family photos. Here are the highlights:

We packed up all our gear and headed for I-90 to head to Spokane.

We stopped by Ellensburg for a bit to shoot some footage of Central Washington University. If you’ve never been before, it’s a pretty neat campus to visit (did you know they have a Japanese Garden on campus?)!

We spoke with a student named Oscar, who was working in the student union & recreation center at CWU, and he let Luke film him hard at work.

Through our social media platforms, we had heard that Seattle witnessed a spectacular sunset today, but Luke and Mike both captured incredible shots of the sunset over the Columbia River Gorge near Vantage on I-90.

At my parents’ house, my mom had prepared a crazy awesome meal of sushi, and naturally, we stuffed ourselves with delicious food. Now, you may or may not like sushi, but you have to appreciate Luke’s artistic photo, right?

After dinner, my younger sister played a bit of piano, and the guys again worked their camera magic.

I have to say…I feel very lucky working with this team. Luke and Mike do phenomenal work with their cameras, and it’s exciting to see all the new ideas they keep coming up with.

Tomorrow, we’ll have a busy day with the CGS event plus more filming in the afternoon; but already, we’ve been able to capture some great footage on this trip. Each time I drive from Seattle to Spokane (and to other parts of Washington), I am reminded of how lucky I feel to live in such a beautiful state.

This trip is about more than just capturing great scenic footage though. While we have our outreach work to do, we are also hoping to hear people’s stories, discuss their concerns, and offer our help in making sure that all students can find viable ways to afford higher education. Whether you come visit our table at CGS events in person or not, we hope you will take the time to share your story with us. You can always email us at secrets@scholarshipjunkies.com.

Stay tuned for more updates from the road tomorrow!

- Sam (and the Scholarship Junkies Team)

Wow! This week’s choices got a little tougher, but we’ve chosen a new winner for our second installment of our weekly photo contest for theWashBoard.org Scholarship Video Contest. Congrats to Chelsea M. from Spokane!

Chelsea’s winning photo captures how scholarships will allow her to study what she’s wildly passionate about. For winning this week’s contest, Chelsea will receive a free t-shirt of her choice from our friends at Wears My Shirt. If you like what you see, you can get your own shirt from their online store too (or this adorable Sugar Lump)!

Wears My Shirt produces great-looking t-shirts that support charities, nonprofits, and foundations who are doing important work in the world, and we are so grateful to them for their support. Huge shout out to Josh and the entire WMS team for supporting our efforts! Thanks a ton!

Don’t you want to win a cool prize like the ones we’ve been giving away too? The next photo contest is already underway, so submit a photo by Sunday night, January 16th! A quick refresher on the rules:

That’s it! So, if you want a shot at next week’s prize, submit your photo now!

– The Scholarship Junkies Team

Thanks to everyone who submitted a photo for the first weekly photo contest as part of TheWashBoard.org Scholarship Video Contest! We are proud to announce that our first weekly winner is Anthony M. from Renton, who submitted an artistic photo of himself filming the ocean against a giant cliffside for the opening sequence of his scholarship video entry.

Anthony will receive a copy of Eric Liu and Nick Hanauer’s newest book, The Gardens of Democracy, donated generously by Eric. For more on the book, check out www.godemocracy.net.

If you’re interested in more of Eric’s work, you can also check out The Guiding Lights Network, which will be hosting the Guiding Lights Weekend at the Seattle Center from March 8-10, 2012. Thanks, Eric, for supporting our scholarship efforts!

This week’s photo contest may be over, but the next one is already underway! So continue submitting your photos (even if you submitted one this week! Except Anthony, of course.) for a shot at winning our next weekly prize. Please submit your photo before Monday, Jan. 9, 2012. We will be announcing our next weekly winner then. Again, a reminder about the rules:

1. Take a picture of yourself (and your group members if you’re submitting your entry as a group; remember, no more than three total members) as you make your scholarship video. Your picture—preferably, scholarship-themed—can be humorous, profound, artistic, or whatever you want to share as long as it’s appropriate (the official rules from the video contest similarly apply).
2. Give your photo a short scholarship-themed caption/description with the format “[Insert short caption/description] — [Insert group members' first names and last initials], [Insert your city], theWashBoard.org Weekly Photo Contest.” Basically, tell us how your photo relates to scholarships/your scholarship video entry.
3. Post the picture and your caption to the Facebook Wall of theWashBoard.org at www.facebook.com/thewashboardorg.

When we launched theWashBoard.org Scholarship Video Contest, we wanted to keep students/applicants engaged in the scholarship application process, so we decided to launch a weekly photo contest as well—with prizes for the best picture of the week. But we didn’t want to just give away free stuff that you could probably get at a college fair or similar event. You know what we’re talking about: keychains, pens, etc.

So we asked around our community to see if folks doing cool things would be willing to donate a few items to give away as prizes. Thanks to the generosity of some stellar individuals, here are a few of the prizes YOU could win by submitting a photo of you (and/or your team) making your scholarship video (more on contest guidelines):

• The Gardens of Democracy: A New American Story of Citizenship, the Economy, and the Role of Government (2011) by Eric Liu and Nick Hanuaer | This book is literally hot off the press (it came out in early December 2011!), and thanks to the generosity of Eric and Nick, you could be reading a copy of your own soon and looking at democracy through a whole new set of lenses. For more, visit www.godemocracy.net.
• HELP! IDK What I Want To Do With My Life (2010) by Juwon Melvin and Aaron Madonna | Juwon and Aaron are a dynamic duo who live lives full of passion, and thanks to their generosity, you could soon be reading their book and moving toward fulfilling your own dreams. More at www.thriveordie.com.
• T-shirts from Wears My Shirt | Founder/President Josh Unruh and our friends at Wears My Shirt have generously offered a few of their awesome t-shirts as prizes—and in turn, you might be able to help them support their charities and partner programs. Check out the organizations and efforts they support (and more!) at www.wearsmyshirt.com.
• MillionDollar$cholar: Winning the Scholarship Race (2011) | Derrius Quarles graduated from high school with more than $1 million in scholarship offers from private scholarships and universities/colleges alike. Based on what he learned, Derrius wrote a book (published and released in September 2011), and thanks to his generosity, you might soon be reading your own copy too. For more, check out www.milliondollarscholar.com.

We’ll be awarding weekly prizes beginning on Monday, January 2, 2012. These prizes are listed in no particular order, but each and every one of them is a pretty cool prize, we think. We’ve got some other great prizes donated from generous community supporters as well that we’ll be giving away as we travel around Washington state to spread the word about the Scholarship Video Contest, scholarship resources such as theWashBoard.org, and our own scholarship secrets.

So, keep spreading the word and take a picture or two as you (and your friends, if you’re in a group) make your scholarship video. Who knows, if you post your picture to theWashBoard.org’s Facebook page, you just might win one of these prizes. Remember, you can enter each week (you can only win one prize though), so keep snapping those pictures while you make your video!

- The Scholarship Junkies team

We hope you had a great holiday weekend and are enjoying your winter break. Last week, we launched the first weekly photo contest for theWashBoard.org Scholarship Video Contest, asking you to submit a photo of you making your scholarship video for a chance to win cool prizes from our community supporters.

We didn’t meet our minimum number of entries for this week’s photo contest, so we’re pushing the deadline back to Monday, Jan. 2, 2012. So get your cameras ready and take a picture or two of you (and your friends, if you’re doing a group video) making your scholarship video.

For more on the photo contest, check out last week’s blog announcement. Then check back here next week to find out if your photo will be the winning photo! Happy New Year!

Photo Credit: Michael Peralta

On Dec. 15th, we announced the launch of the inaugural theWashBoard.org Scholarship Video Contest and your chance to win up to $3,000 in scholarship awards. Today, we’re announcing a weekly photo contest during the video contest period through which you could win cool prizes from various community sponsors. The rules are simple:

1. Take a picture of yourself (and your group members if you’re submitting your entry as a group; remember, no more than three total members) as you make your scholarship video. Your picture—preferably, scholarship-themed—can be humorous, profound, artistic, or whatever you want to share as long as it’s appropriate (the official rules from the video contest similarly apply).
2. Give your photo a short caption/description with the format “[Insert short caption/description] — [Insert group members' first names and last initials], theWashBoard.org Weekly Photo Contest.”
3. Post the picture and your caption to the Facebook Wall of theWashBoard.org at www.facebook.com/thewashboardorg

Each week, prizes will be awarded for the best picture selected by our team. Your video entry does not need to be submitted yet to participate in the photo contest, but you must enter the video contest by Jan. 31, 2012, to receive a photo contest prize.

The first prize will be announced on Monday, Dec. 26th, and each following Monday until Jan. 31, 2012. If you’re not selected as a weekly winner, you can continue to submit photos each week!

Our prizes were generously donated by some of our community partners and friends, and we’ll share what those are when we announce winners each week. If you have any questions, email us at info@thewashboardcontest.org.

Start taking those pictures!