Financial Aid

Well, I finally heard back from Semester at Sea regarding my scholarship! I received an email from Ryan Roth around 5pm today saying that I can check my MyVoyage account to see if I received aid. I was a little aprehensive about looking because I was afraid that I wasn't going to have received anything. But, I did. 3,000$ actually. I was hoping for around 5k but I'll take 3k. That's 3,000$ less than I have to pay out of pocket now. I still have tons of things that I need to do to get everything in line...like apply for a loan, finish getting my signatures for the classes I'd like to take, filing out the online China and India Visa applications, getting my shots and vaccinations, all that good jazz...It's starting to come together slowly but surely though.

I've run a spreadsheet for all my potential costs associated with Semester at Sea and I'm looking at roughly 30,000$. That's A LOT of money. My mom has been working hard on getting addresses and such for me to send sponsorship packets out. She received a reply from one company saying that they're not in the position right now to give donations so I hope that this isn't a trend. I really would like to hope/think that there are good people out there who wouldn't mind sponsoring me. 50$-100$ really isn't that much money for a company to sponsor me with. I'd like to think that in a few years time, if I received a letter from a student asking for help to travel, I would generously give back. What goes around comes around. I just have to keep hoping that I've done enough good to receive good in return. We shall see...I'll keep this updated as the weeks start to peel away. I have 120 days til I leave! It's getting much closer! I can't wait!