Editor’s note: Each week, the San Antonio Report publishes a brief synopsis of the weekly bigcitysmalltown podcast hosted by Robert Rivard, co-founder of the Report.
Raylynn Hampton, 27, is one busy San Antonian.
She works as an administrative assistant to the principal at Oak Meadow Elementary School while pursuing her degree in education online through Southern New Hampshire University, starting a nonprofit to develop emotional learning curricula and raising her 3-year-old daughter, Amira.
That’s all possible thanks to a scholarship from United Way of San Antonio and Bexar County, Hampton said. A majority of her child care costs are covered with a $12,000 grant.
“It has done a lot for my life beyond, you know, just being able to afford child care,” she said as Amira playfully tugged on her mother’s necklace. “I have completely done a 360 in my life from where I was to here.”
For the latest bigcitysmalltown podcast, Hampton and her daughter joined Naphtali Bryant, United Way’s child care scholarship coordinator, in the studio to talk about her plans for the future, the scholarship’s unique funding source and how it works.
Women United, a group of like-minded United Way donors originally founded as Women’s Leadership Council by the late philanthropist Joci Straus, hosts an annual Power of the Purse luncheon and purse auction that benefits United Way Child Care Scholarships.
The last event in April, which auctioned off high-end purses from local and international designers, raised about $294,000 in one day, Bryant said. “It gets real competitive.”
That combined with other fundraising efforts has the scholarship fund at more than $750,000, Bryant said.
Selected scholars, of which there are 23 in the current cycle, are enrolled in a post-secondary education program, are not enrolled in any other subsidized child care program and are committed to maintaining a minimum GPA of 2.5.
“I will graduate, relatively debt-free, but [that] I will be graduating at all [is] thanks to this program,” Hampton said.
The scholarship also requires completion of a financial literacy course, monthly meetings with Bryant and connection with a mentor through Women United’s more than 3,100-member network.
“So now you get that opportunity to get the resumes [and] you get the networking events so when you graduate, there’s a great possibility that you get the job you’re looking for,” he said.
