More Than a Test Score

Meet Hannah Rivard, yet another Scholarship Matching winner who will be awarded for using Zinch! A soon-to-be sophomore in the fall at Northwestern College in Minnesota, Hannah has big plans for her future. Though she’ll joke about it, it’s apparent that she knows exactly what she wants to do and how to achieve it. Congratulations and good luck, Hannah!

What was your reaction when you heard we were matching your scholarship?

It was hard for me to believe! I’m so used to things like Zinch either being too good to be true or never happening to me, and here it was true and it did happen to me! I felt so blessed that I found Zinch and the scholarships on it.

What are your plans for the future?

That question always makes my mom laugh. What plans?! But no, actually, I do have a direction I am going. I would like to have a horse training business (I’ve started it now, it’s called Cambria Horsemanship) that trains liberty and bridleless horses (without tack, ropes, bridles, etc.), teaches others how to train and acts with/trains those horses for use in film. That combines my two deep passions of horse training and acting, as well as my applying of my Christian faith to everything in life, as my horse training method specifically draws from Christian principles and worldview.

What do you do on rainy days?

I’m often inside writing, practicing music or watching horse training DVDs. Sometimes I play with and train my dogs inside the house, or play with my horse in the indoor arena!

What one food could you not live without?

Peanut butter! Peanut butter goes with everything. Cookies, bread, pancakes, waffles, ice cream, hot chocolate and graham crackers. It’s like the ‘magic food of amazingness.’

If you could have dinner with 3 people (dead or alive), who would it be and why?

One would definitely be C.S. Lewis – his books have completely changed my life, and I would love to interact with such a godly, yet humorous and humble man. Another would be Carolyn Resnick, an amazing horsewoman who seeks to train horses through connection and relationship, not force. I use a lot of her methods. I hope this doesn’t sound creepy, but I would be interested to meet Hitler or Stalin face to face. It would be frightening, certainly, but sometimes I think we forget that they were people, too. What were they truly like under all that anger and pain? I guess that is the question we should ask of any person.

How are you more than a test score?

I am more than a test score because I am a child of God! Whether I perform wonderfully or horribly on tests, He still loves me and I still have infinite worth.

Have you found and won a scholarship on Zinch? Let us know because you just might be eligible for a Scholarship Matching Award!

Eric Arevalo found and won a scholarship on Zinch and now he is being rewarded. Why, you ask? Because he’s smart enough to use Zinch to help find money for college. Want to know more about him? Well, he’s an excessive coffee and hot chocolate drinker, plays guitar, loves cereal more than any other food, and is about to start his senior year at USC. You can tell he has his priorities in order and is passionate about what he does.

Why do you deserve this scholarship?
I don’t deserve this scholarship any more than all the other hard-working students out there. But I’ve been extremely fortunate to find an organization around here (L.A.) that recognizes students from underrepresented backgrounds who truly aim to make a difference in this world. It’s my dedication to the community and to the poor that got my this scholarship. And I am super lucky Zinch was there to match it for me!

What was your reaction when you heard we were matching your scholarship?
I was stoked! I initially thought that there had to be some catch or something in fine print that would prevent me from getting the scholarship. I mean, since when do websites/organizations give out money so easily?  Once I was told I received the matching scholarship and the money came in, however, I was extremely grateful!

What are your plans for the future?
I am currently working at a non-profit, documentary film-making company that showcases unique and extraordinary humanitarian efforts of different people/organizations around the world! Once I graduate, I’d eventually like to start my own independent chain of documentaries that focus on social issues such as poverty and show what can be done to treat these issues. My family being from Nicaragua, I’ve always had a deep connection and sympathetic attitude towards the poor, so as long as I am doing something that reaches out to the less fortunate, I am happy!

What’s the first thing you would grab on your way out the door if your house caught fire?
My baby kitten! I just adopted him about 6 months ago and now he is my best friend. Plus, what could possibly be more brutal than seeing a cute and fluffy white kitten catch fire and burn?? :(

If you could have dinner with 3 people (dead or alive), who would it be and why?
Jesus, Tom Delonge from Blink182, and Kobe Bryant. Jesus to answer all my life’s questions, Tom because he is my all-time favorite musician, and Kobe because he’s the man.

If you had a million dollars and you had to spend it on yourself, what would you do?
First, I would pay off tuition for next year along with my school debt! Then, I’d buy a decent car since my current one is 19 years old, falling to scraps, and probably has only a few months of life left in it. I’d invest some money in getting a nice video camera for shooting all my films, and then probably just put the rest of the money in the bank!

If you could change one thing in history, what would it be and why?
I’d take back the Holocaust, which in my opinion stands as one of the most atrocious events to ever occur in history. I’ve been educated a lot on the Holocaust, and there are so many awful stories and so much pain surrounding it, even several decades after its occurrence.

How are you more than a test score?
I have never felt that my grades or my test scores define who I am. They are probably the least important thing when it comes to understanding me and what I’m all about. I am a musician, a filmmaker, an athlete, a loving brother, and a loyal friend. These are the things that define my character, not letter grades or percentages.

Feeling a little jealous? Well, start looking for scholarships on Zinch and you could be the next matching winner!

We love matching scholarships, dollar-for-dollar, here at Zinch, and we think Zinchers don’t mind being matched either. In fact, I think Ellen Wieberg is a big fan of the Scholarship Matching program at the moment. She loves traveling and curling up with a good book, and, apparently, planning for the future since she’s only a junior in high school and has already won more than one scholarship.

Why do you deserve this scholarship?

I have applied for probably over $100,000 worth of scholarships and this is finally my “big break.” Since I am only a junior, I think that this shows how dedicated I am to my future education and how much I want to succeed at whatever I choose to become.

What are your plans for the future?

There are so many options for the future that it is super hard to pick. If I had to choose my future right now… I would plan to major in communications and leadership and get a job where I would get to work with people every day. I want to have a family and I want to volunteer as much as possible. Basically, what I’m saying is that I want my own perfect version of the American dream.

What’s the first thing you would grab on your way out the door if your house caught fire?

So, this is kind of dorky, but I like scrap-booking a lot. I made a scrapbook of my childhood up through my high school years and I have probably spent like 100 hours on it so I would grab that. It is supposed to be something for me to look at and remember good times.

If you could be a superhero, what would you want your superpowers to be?

I would want to be able to teleport so I would never have to worry about having a car (or paying for gas money) and if I wanted to go someplace far, like Germany, I could just pick up and go.

Want us to match your scholarship, be featured on our blog and be one step closer to paying for college? Let us know if you find and win a scholarship on Zinch and you can!

We are happy to introduce Quinn Colter, winner of a Zinch Matching Scholarship after finding and winning a scholarship on Zinch. She’s hilarious, ambitious, and very smart. We’re proud of students like her who just keep going despite the discouragement they may face. Congratulations, Quinn, you deserve this!

What are your plans for the future?

Go to college. Double major in English and Biology.  Get a job as a copy editor in a book publishing house (if the book publishing world doesn’t implode like people keep telling me it’s going to), or if that doesn’t work out, get a job doing something biological (maybe botany).  Get married.  Raise a family.  Help someone become a better, stronger, happier person (and then keep doing it).

What do you do on rainy days?

Usually I go out and get wet; always, I mourn the fact that I don’t have bright yellow rubber galoshes to splash in puddles with.

What one food could you not live without?

How can you ask me to choose just one?  My top three contenders are bread, soup, and pesto–and I think that bread is the one that I really and truly could not live without.

If you could have dinner with 3 people (dead or alive), who would it be and why?

I’ll have “Authors of Classic Novels” for $500 and pick Fyodor Dostoyevsky, Franz Kafka, and Emily Bronte.  Why?  They’ve all made me want to ask them that same question.  To Mr. Dostoyevsky, “Why are you so depressed?”; to Mr. Kafka, “Why do you have so many issues?”; and to Miss Bronte…  Well, just “WHY?!”

If you could be a superhero, what would you want your superpowers to be?

I want to fly and be able to fix spelling and grammar errors with a point of my finger.  You can call me Grammar Girl.

If you could change one thing in history, what would it be and why?

I would stop that Serbian anarchist from killing the Archduke Ferdinand.  Can you imagine what historical implications that would have?  If I could prevent WWI, it might prevent the Great Depression, WWII, all the miscellaneous conflicts in the Cold War…  That one event led to so many others.  Even if it wouldn’t stop the European alliances from getting themselves into a twist (they hadn’t fought a real war in a goodly long time, and back then Europeans seemed to get tetchy when they’d not had a war for too long), it would change the course of modern history down entirely unpredictable paths.

How are you more than a test score?

A test score cannot convey how well I write (25-minute essays say nothing about how well a person can actually write; they only say how well a person can write a 25-minute essay).  It cannot express that I’m a trained choral soprano, nor can it show that I cook delicious food, nor can it reveal that I have ninja skills (no, really), nor can it demonstrate my propensity for using macro focusing in my photography.

A single number, written in black ink on white paper, is not the measure of a student’s worth.  I am more than a test score because I am a living human being, with talents and interests ranging far beyond the factors standardized tests claim to be measuring.  My test scores do not tell me that I am smart, they tell me that I have inherited my father’s talent for taking multiple-choice tests.  Test scores are something I get.  The more important things to consider about me are the things that I give.

Meet Karyn Stanley, our most recent Matching winner who found and won a scholarship on Zinch. Because of this, we matched it and now she is one step closer to paying for college. With hopes of being a board-certified geophysicist, Karyn is a passionate learner who has a thirst for success. Let’s hear more about her with a few random questions.

What’s the first thing you would grab on your way out the door if your house caught fire?

My MacBook Pro. I love it!

What one food could you not live without?

Cheese. I love cheese on about anything. It’s just so good.

If you could have dinner with 3 people (dead or alive), who would it be and why?

Albert Einstein, Abraham Lincoln, and Homer Hickam. All three of these men are pioneers in their own right, and all are an inspiration to me.

If you had a million dollars and you had to spend it on yourself, what would you do?

I would keep about $200,000 for myself to pay my college tuition and then would use the remaining money to start a foundation. The world needs more budding Geologists and Geophysicists, especially from the Southeast U.S.

If you could change one thing in history, what would it be and why?

I don’t believe in changing history because everyday and every event is merely a stepping stone to the next. Every day is valuable.

How are you more than a test score?

I believe that all people have the ability to transcend the numbers that bind them to the status quo. Numbers can’t define my work ethic, my personality, or my ability to give.

If you’ve found and won a scholarship on Zinch, don’t hesitate to let us know! We love hearing form you, so be sure to shoot us an email over at winner[at]zinch.com.