America’s Charities Unveils New Scholarship Program to Help Improve Educational Opportunities, Build a Better-educated Workforce, and Scale Scholarship Funding

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Washington, D.C. – November 28, 2022 – In celebration of National Scholarship Month/National Education Month, which takes place in November each year, America’s Charities is excited to unveil its new Scholarship Program, designed to help organizations provide educational opportunities for students, support professional advancement for employees, and build a better-educated workforce for the community.

Leveraging its more than 40 years’ experience and expertise in charitable funds management, employee assistance fund application administration, and relief fund grant distribution, America’s Charities will administer scholarship programs for organizations who want to provide tax-free awards that can be used to assist scholarship awardees with expenses such as, tuition and fees required for enrollment or attendance at an educational institution, or for fees, books, supplies, and equipment required for courses at an educational institution.

The cost of higher education is an enormous barrier for individuals hoping to advance their educations and careers, particularly for working adults and non-traditional students. As reported by Forbes, “in 1980, the price to attend a four-year college full-time was $10,231 annually—including tuition, fees, room and board, and adjusted for inflation—according to the National Center for Education Statistics. By 2019-20, the total price increased to $28,775. That’s a 180% increase.”

As a recent report from Georgetown University highlights, “Today, two out of three jobs require postsecondary education and training, while three out of four jobs in the 1970s required a high school diploma or less. Yet while young people today need more education than ever to compete in the labor market, a college education is more expensive than in the past.”

“Recognizing the necessity of making educational opportunities more affordable and attainable for individuals, employers and nonprofit organizations alike have stepped up to the plate to provide assistance – and more and more organizations are looking to America’s Charities’ expertise to help facilitate and scale these types of programs,” said Jim Starr, president and CEO of America’s Charities. “We’ve been honored to power workplace giving, matching gift, volunteering, disaster relief, and employee assistance fund programs for some of the country’s most reputable organizations since our founding in 1980. Bringing employers, their employees, and nonprofits together to help the community and each other is at the heart of everything we do, and we have seen firsthand the appetite among companies large and small for providing financial assistance to their employees and individuals in the community. Adding scholarship application and grant management to our service offerings just seems like a natural progression towards achieving our own mission, as well as the broader social responsibility goals of the organizations we serve.”

Whether organizations are looking to scale their existing scholarship programs, need to outsource administration of their program from tax or legal purposes, or simply want to get started and create a scholarship fund from scratch, America’s Charities’ new Scholarship Program aims to make it easy by providing direction on scholarship policy, managing the scholarship application process, providing donation technology to secure scholarship funding, distributing scholarship money to educational institutions, and offering marketing and communications support.

Visit www.charities.org/scholarships for more information about America’s Charities’ Scholarship Program.

About America’s Charities

As a 501(c)(3) tax-exempt public charity, America’s Charities has raised and distributed more than $800 million for more than 25,000 nonprofits globally through the workplace giving, matching gifts, disaster relief, and volunteer programs it manages each year for corporate, federal, state, and local government employers. These campaigns provide a critical source of unrestricted, sustainable funding nonprofits rely on each year to keep their doors open and address a wide range of causes including education, environmental protection, human and civil rights, hunger, poverty, research and health services, animal welfare, veteran assistance, and disaster relief. In addition to facilitating charitable giving initiatives that support nonprofits, America’s Charities helps companies support their workforce financially through Employee Assistance Funds (EAFs). Since piloting its EAF services to a handful of businesses in 2019, America’s Charities has grown this new service substantially facilitating more than 150 new Employee Assistance Funds (EAFs) for employers to date, managing more than $20 million in grants designated to help employees cope with unexpected hardships. More information about America’s Charities is at www.charities.org, as well as on our social media networks.

###

Media Contact:

Sarah Ford

Marketing Director, America’s Charities

sford@charities.org