By Shawn Yaftali ’17

A majority of graduating seniors are faced with the dilemma of having to pay for costly college tuition. Several graduates have found a solution to this issue through Raise.me, a startup website aimed at making college more accessible for students. The site provides a maximum of $80,000 to pay for college.

Founded by three friends, Preston Silverman, George Kirkland and Dave Schuman in 2012, Raise.me wanted to solve a problem: The United States offers billions of dollars for scholarships and grants each year, but only offer them during the end of high school. In most cases, this is too late to impact where students choose to apply or whether they apply at all. In order to solve this problem, the website works with colleges from across the country to provide “micro-scholarships,” or small payments for high school achievements, to students.

The micro-scholarships are guaranteed if the student enrolls in the university that grants the scholarship. The aid is then given to the student across their college career. “That’s important because we don’t want students in a situation where they receive a lot of aid for their first year and in subsequent years aren’t receiving as much aid,” explained Silverman.

Raise.me has the backing of some big names, including the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation and Facebook. Recently, several well-known colleges such as Notre Dame, Penn State, and Carnegie Mellon have joined their ever-growing list of over 130 partnerships.