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While casinos are typically known for a part of their revenue to help the state fund public schools, who would have thought that they would also help out college students? A casino located in Kansas, the Kansas Star Casino, has decided that it will make an effort to help out students that are planning to attend local colleges by offering scholarships. Though this is not typical of a casino to do, it is an idea that might encourage other casino operators to follow suit. People might be more apt to visit their casinos to know that more funding is being appropriated to help fund different levels of education.
The Kansas Star Casino will be giving $50,000 worth of scholarship funds to area colleges that include Cowley College, the Wichita State University Athletics Scholarship Organization and Butler Community College. The scholarship funding has been set up by the casino’s own scholarship foundation called the Kansas All-Star Scholars Board. The scholarships that are offered to these area community colleges will be awarded to students that are pursuing degrees in technology, science, engineering, math, and education as well as students that are looking to obtain a career in health management or other health related fields.
The scholarships are not set aside for traditional students that are newly out of high school. Instead, the money is allotted for students that fall in the age group of 25 to 39 years old. This is an age group that typically must balance work, family life and often put their continued education on the back burner. This is an effort that the Kansas Star Casino has collaborated on with the Kansas Board of Regents. This is an effort to help increase the enrollment in community colleges and to target these age groups and seems to be a promising promotional effort between the two. The first scholarships offered by the Kansas Star Casino in conjunction with these community colleges will be awarded in 2013. The various community colleges have received their money to fund their scholarships already so it is a program that is set to go.
The $50,000 scholarship monies are only a portion of the gifts that the Kansas Star Casino offers annually. Each year, the Kansas Star Casino has a budget of $1.5 million in their scholarship fund. High school graduates of 2012 were granted $369,000 in scholarships from this funding program. The fund also granted $555,000 worth of back-to-school reward cards to students in one area private school and eight area public schools. The fund also gifted $239,000 to area schools to help teachers cover additional classroom costs.
While it is pretty common for money to be handed over for public education indirectly by providing the state with an added source of income through taxation, this is a whole different issue. There are so many positives that one could see by the Kansas Star Casino’s efforts. It offers scholarships to people that would not otherwise be able to afford it but unfortunately, the program is very limited to a small targeted area not allowing people to really choose where they get their education. It is a big help to encourage enrollment in these small community colleges.
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