Brown School senior amasses $1M in scholarships

It's not often that a teen who has not even finished high school can amass a $1 million war chest, but Brown School senior Emmanuel Blake Dawson has done just that – scoring handfuls of lucrative scholarship offers in his quest to attend and graduate from college debt-free.

The 17-year-old has spent the last several months filling out applications, typing up essays and going through interviews with one goal: getting cash for college.

The efforts have paid off.

In addition to more than half a dozen scholarships from various organizations – including a $40,000 scholarship with summer employment from Brown-Forman – Blake, who goes by his middle name, has earned full rides to the University of Louisville, Fisk University and Florida A&M University, as well as five-digit offers from 8 other universities.

The total cash offerings: a whopping $1,002,836.

So far.

There are still some scholarships Blake is waiting to hear back about.

"Debate (club) taught me how to market myself," Blake said. He said that while he doesn't have the highest ACT score among his friends – although he does have a respectable score of 28 – he said he focused on telling the story of who he is, playing up his work ethic, his community involvement and his 4.26 GPA.

"I wrote hundreds of essays," Blake said. He wasn't deterred if he didn't make the cut for certain scholarships, he added.

"If you never ask, you'll never know," he said.

Of course, Blake is not actually going to get $1 million in scholarships, since some are from schools he won't end up attending. But his effort certainly means he's off to a much better financial start for higher education than many of his classmates.

Indeed, Blake is headed this fall to Florida A&M University with not only a full scholarship but tens of thousands of dollars in money for additional expenses.

He said he chose Florida A&M University because he wanted to attend a historically black college and said the school has made him feel like family.

A FAMU recruiter called him personally to tell him he'd been offered a full-ride scholarship; Blake had been on his way to pick up a girl for a date but ended up being an hour late as he sat in his car outside her house talking to the recruiter. (The girl and her parents – who both attended FAMU – were OK with his being late when he explained why, he said.)

Getting all the scholarships was a difficult feat, Blake allows. But he said his father helped keep him organized, his mother – a retired Jefferson County Public Schools principal – helped encourage him, and several community groups helped by writing letters of recommendation. Blake set aside hours every Saturday and during the week to specifically work on applications.

Blake said he once even had to go into school to speak with a Fisk recruiter on the same day as his granny's funeral. It was difficult but he said he also knew how important it was, so he went – and ended up with one of the school's prestigious Erastus Milo Cravath Presidential Scholarships.

"It was a lot," Greg Dawson, Blake's father, said of the work involved in getting scholarships. He said he kept a file for every school and the family had a master to-do checklist in the kitchen to keep track of everything, which Dawson said he was glad to be able to take down recently.

Mom Opal Dawson said she and her husband set the tone early that they expected Blake to go to college without incurring debt by getting scholarships to cover his schooling.

"As an educator, we talk about a mindset of excellence," she said. "Once he knew what it felt like to be successful, he was able to repeat it again and again."

Dawson's accomplishment is a rare feat but certainly not impossible, said Erin Klarer, vice president of government relations with the Kentucky Higher Education Assistance Authority.

"When we talk to students and parents about how to plan and prepare to pay for college, we often stress that if you treat earning good grades and your scholarship search like a job, the money is there for the taking," Klarer said. "And there are so many free resources to help, all they need to invest is their time."

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Pam Royster, college and career readiness specialist with Jefferson County Public Schools, said she doesn't believe she's seen any other student come anywhere near the amount of scholarships Blake has earned.

But she agreed with Klarer that getting a lot of scholarship money is doable for students who are willing to put in the time and effort.

"Everyone thinks you have to be a super genius to get a scholarship," Royster said.

But she said scholarships are not just about GPA or test score; instead, there are scholarships for all types of talents and abilities, from duck-calling to being left-handed. She said she's even seen a scholarship for students who are tall.

Royster also pointed out that small scholarships can pile up to a sizeable sum. "$500 plus $500 plus $500 adds up," she said. "You'll be happy for it down the road when you realize the long-term benefits."

Indeed, with the rising cost of college, students are often leaving college with significant student loan debt that can take decades to pay off.

About 64 percent of Kentucky's baccalaureate graduates leave college with student debt that averages $26,000, according to the Kentucky Higher Education Assistance Authority.

"It was once possible to work part-time and attend college part-time and incur no debt," Klarer said in an email. "Those days are long gone as government chooses to transfer much of the cost directly to the consumers of postsecondary education."

JCPS' graduating Class of 2015 earned $172,519,974 in scholarship awards last spring, JCPS spokesman Daniel Kemp said.

But Royster said it's possible that amount could have been even higher. She said some community organizations offer scholarships but they go unfilled because no one ends up applying.

"We try to get the word out," Royster said. "Unless it's $10,000, it's not worth the effort to some kids."

Klarer said it's important that families fill out the Free Application for Federal Student Aid form, saying that "virtually all financial aid programs key off it in one form or another." And then follow Blake's example and get to work finding and applying for scholarships.

"If you approach it like it's a job, that is kind of how you have to think about it," Royster said. "Your reward is getting a scholarship."

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Reporter Allison Ross can be reached at (502) 582-4241. Follow the Courier-Journal's education team at Facebook.com/SchooledCJ.