LAKE FOREST, Calif. –Eagle Community Credit Union has awarded scholarships to four local students.
The credit union gave each recipient $4,000 to help with college expenses. The recipients are Jacob Christensen, who is planning on attending Princeton; Javier Sanchez, who attends California State University, Fullerton; Dominic Johnson, who plans to go to San Francisco State University; and Justin Chang, who plans to attend the University of Southern California.
The annual scholarship program has been offered by the credit union for the past 30 years. This year, it was increased to four winners at $4,000 apiece. Recipients must be members of the credit unions and have to be students, but there is no age limit. Each has to submit transcripts, and essay, and a list of extracurricular activities. This year’s essay was on “we can make credit unions more attractive to youth.”
Javier Sanchez, in his essay, provided some ideas on what types of outreach to youth credit unions could do: “To reach younger people, credit unions need to make massive strides in educating those who are inexperienced with their finances, and in advertising what a credit union is. Representatives could go to high schools, universities, and pour more into social media and Internet-based mediums to reach out to people who are just making the adjustment to adult life. Credit unions need to put more focus on technological resources and marketing. People of my age group enjoy easily accessible applications that can smoothly streamline their financial lives. If credit unions could find a way to improve in these areas, they would be successful in appealing to a younger base.”