For too many students, higher education feels financially out of reach. Outstanding student loan debt in the United States in 2017 was around $1.42 trillion and the average student loan balance for 2016 graduates was $37,172, up 6% from 2015.  Especially when combined with a lack of a degree, student loan debt impedes economic mobility for a lifetime. An innovative, new approach to financial aid distribution is needed, not just to increase the post-secondary education completion rate of students, but to provide access to higher education to individuals from diverse economic backgrounds. Earn to Learn is a promising solution that is addressing many of the issues facing low- to moderate- income students and families in Arizona. Combining student savings with scholarships, financial education, and success coaching, Earn to Learn helps LMI students obtain a college degree and graduate ready to enter the workforce with little to no student loan debt.  

 

 

Kate Hoffman is the executive director and founder of Earn to Learn, a nonprofit that empowers low- to moderate- income students to successfully complete college by providing matched-savings grants, personal finance training, and workforce readiness. Hoffman founded the organization to help LMI students and their families close the opportunity gap by investing in their own education. She worked to facilitate a collaboration between Arizona's three public universities, the Arizona Board of Regents, high schools, community colleges, and financial service providers to launch Earn to Learn in 2013. Earn to Learn operates one of the largest and most successful individual development account programs in the country. Students who income-qualify save $500 per academic year. These funds are matched 8:1, bringing their total scholarship award to $4,500. Combining student savings with scholarships, financial education, and success coaching, Earn to Learn helps LMI students obtain a college degree and graduate ready to enter the workforce with little to no student loan debt. Prior to launching Earn to Learn, Hoffman worked in the financial services sector managing over $100 million in assets. The crisis in higher education inspired her to focus her boundless energy on helping LMI students and their families have every opportunity to achieve the dream of a college education by eliminating barriers, building financial assets and creating pathways out of poverty.

The Internet is without a doubt one of the best resources available to us. Unfortunately it's also extremely dangerous if you aren't aware of who and what lurks behind the scenes. Everyone should know how to be safe when surfing the web, installing apps on devices and just plugging in a new appliance.  Michael Peller will break down some of the simpler things that you can do without being a technology geek.  Some of these tips, you undoubtedly may have heard, but many may be new to you.

 

Rotary Club of Tucson has sponsored the Amphitheater Interact Club and Rotaract Club of the University of Arizona for the past five years.  We have provided financial support as well as advisors to both clubs.  We share sponsorship for the UofA Rotaract Club with Sunrise Rotary.

 

 

Maricela is the Director of Operations & Government Relations of World View, an Arizona based spaceflight company that operates in two primary business segments: Stratollite uncrewed flight systems Stratollites, offer low-cost, long-duration, persistent high-altitude flight for enterprise and government agencies.  As Director of operations and government relations, Maricela oversees all hiring, IT and government relations.

   

 

To the UA and the Tucson Community,

 

Thank you all for such a warm welcome. I am thrilled to be here at the University of Arizona. From the open house at Old Main on my first day, to lunch with students in the Union, and a stop at UAHS to wish our medical school transition students good luck on their finals, this is just the beginning. 

Dr. Paul Bendheim is a board-certified neurologist and a Clinical Professor of Neurology with the University of Arizona, College of Medicine in Phoenix.  Dr. Bendheim graduated from the University of Arizona College of Medicine and is affiliated with Saint Joseph Hospital and Medical Center.  Over the years of his career in neurology, he has diagnosed many people with Alzheimer's and other dementias and became increasingly interested in studying and determining how he could help others to improve and maintain their brain function. 

 

 

Maestro Gomez will speak about his new life in Tucson as he approaches the finale of his inaugural season. He will focus on why a strong symphony is important to Tucson and how the orchestra plays an integral role in the education of our young people.  In addition, he will share some highlights of the TSO’s upcoming 90th season and our developing relationship with Mexico.

 

Team penning isn’t just a rodeo event. This year, it’s a literary event at the Tucson Festival of Books featuring co-authors Alan Day and Lynn Wiese Sneyd. They’ll give us the low down on what it was like to write and publish their newest book, “Cowboy Up! Life Lessons from Lazy B.”

 

Rotary Youth Exchange first began with the Copenhagen, Denmark club initiating the first exchange in 1929 which was followed by the Rotary Club of Nice, France.  Rotary Youth Exchange is one of the most recognized youth exchange programs in the world and is by far the largest youth exchange program run completely by volunteers.  The year-long program was created in 1958 replacing a much shorter time program of only several weeks.  Many of the rules and procedures and frameworks of the program that were created in 1958 still exist today. 

 

Located in a former tire shop in the heart of Barrio Santa Rosa, just south of Downtown, Sonoran Glass School is a hidden gem. Founded in 2001 by glass artists Tom Philabaum and Dave Klein, the school has grown to be the only full-service, nonprofit glass arts education facility in the Southwest, offering classes to established and emerging artists from five to eighty-five. Executive Director, Lynn Davis, will give us a virtual tour of Sonoran Glass School and offer an overview of the different glass mediums taught there. You’ll discover why Tucson has a special place on the American Studio Glass map.